Jaffa part 2

This is the second part of the interview with Ramy Sayyegh, history teacher and tour guide in Jaffa. It is the continuation of episode 9. In the first part we heard about the history of Jaffa from the ancient times until the Ottoman era. In this episode we speak about the big changes that happened to the city of Jaffa and for the residents of Jaffa with the arrival of the European colonial powers, the Zionist immigrants and the United Nations Partition Plan.

Ramy describes the response of the Jaffa residents to the coming of the British Mandate and the Zionist militias. We talk about the year 1948 in which the State of Israel was created, Jaffa was depopulated and most of its residents became refugees. And of course Ramy tells us about Jaffa today. Who lives in Jaffa, what do tourists visit when they come to Jaffa and who benefits from the tourism to Jaffa?!

You can contact Ramy on instagram if you want to organize a tour in Jaffa.

https://instagram.com/Ramysa78

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Transcript

Jaffa part 2

 Kristel: In the previous episode about Jaffa, we spoke about the history of Jaffa from the ancient times until the Ottoman period. We finished in the late 19th beginning of the 20th century and by that time the Ottoman empire was called the Sick Man of Europe and it was clear that it was crumbling down. Ramy, can you explain what happened in the beginning of the 20th century when the European powers realized this and how did this affect Palestine in general and in Jaffa in particular? 

Rami: Well, actually this is a very large question because we're talking about the beginning of 20th century, but when we are talking about Palestine it was divided in, let's say two parts, because at the beginning of the 20th century, the Ottomans were still here until 1917 when they lost the first world war, especially when they lost the Arab lands, those who weren't countries yet like Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, East of Jordan. And after 1917, the British came and occupied those territories and actually the British and the French mandate started officially in 1920.

So what happened in the beginning of 20th century?  The European powers, especially Britain and France were actually well known with the Ottoman agreement with the Germans back then in the seventies. And they were actually afraid for losing their control over the Arab lands, territories and especially the Gulf, the Arabic Gulf.

And from that time, they started to enter through their companies, to Iraq, to Palestine, to Lebanon, to Syria in order to take advantage from the Arab oil and to stay there until they will occupy it officially. So at the beginning of the 20th century, Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman occupied those territories at the beginning of the 16th century, when they defeated the Safawi powers and they occupied the Arab territory until Egypt’s borders with Libya and they were there until 1917.

Their last era, let's say the 20th century, was actually cooperated with the Europeans. They weren't enemies until the First World War. They were cooperating with every kind of issue. If you can imagine, for example, in Jaffa, we have many European schools that actually were established at that era at the end of the 19th century. And they flourished on the 20th century. For example, the Scottish School was established on 1864 before Abdulhamid the Second became Sultan. 

1882, the French built in Jaffa, in the main street right next to Tabita, their own school: College de Freres. And when you cross the street, you'll find the French hospital, which was built also in the 19th century.  Later on in the 20th century Jaffa and Palestine was actually flourishing even before the British came.  Just to mention the historical events after the Ottomans, the new Ottomans they became the actual ruler when they told Abdulhamid that he is no longer the Sultan in 1909.  From that time, 1909 until the First World War, the new Ottomans took control of the Ottoman Empire and they started the new regime, if you can say, and they were anti Arabs, they were anti everything that concerned non Turkish language and Turkish culture.

So they started to punish everyone who was against their vision, especially the leaders in the Arab areas that we mentioned. And here in Jaffa, they were actually executed. When Jamal Pasha was the governor of this area of Palestine and he was actually one of the main rulers together with another two Pashas, Pasha and Anuar Pasha. Those three Musketeers, if we can give them those names, they started to fight actually against everyone who had the national Arab ideas. 

So at the beginning of the 19th century, 20th century, actually, we had those two eras. Later on when the British occupied Palestine 1917, at the end of the 1917, actually we know, and we are aware of the famous photo from Jerusalem when General Allenby entered the gate of Jaffa in Jerusalem.

This was actually a few days before Christmas. So he made this march, especially in Jerusalem in order to show the world that now Britain is the new power that will control over Palestine. And the British newspaper wrote down that finally, a Christian ruler is in Palestine after hundreds of years of Islamic power. Jaffa in general was actually part of Palestine from the era of the Ottomans. It actually started to flourish at the 19th Century, at the beginning of the 19th Century, right after Napoleon left Jaffa in 1799, 1800 and it started flourishing until the middle of the 20th century until the thirties of the 20th century, when I mentioned the Palestinian revolution.

So Jaffa actually was part of Palestine. And when the British took control over Palestine, they took control over the cities, the Palestinian cities like Jaffa and Haifa and Acca. And they knew that those cities are very important for them from political view, general view and actually financial, they took control over those cities in order to stay in control also in the Mediterranean and to pass their goods to Southeast of Asia. So this is what happened after they took control over Palestine and the Arab land. 

Kristel: So what did Jaffa look like? What kind of city was it in the beginning of the 20th Century?

Ramy: Jaffa at the beginning of the 20th century started to flourish also outside of the walls.  We're not talking about only the old city of Jaffa, actually Jaffa residents started to build their own projects, their own neighborhoods. For example, at the South side, they built Ajami and South of Ajami they built Jabaliya. Jabaliya actually came from the area of Gazastrip, Jabaliya. It's the same word, but sometimes we pronounce it different. Here in Jaffa we call it Jabaliya but it's actually written in Arabic Jabaliya. And this is the first connection between Gaza and Jaffa or maybe the recent connection between Jaffa and Gaza.

 The Gaza residents came to Jaffa in the 19th century, at the end of 19th Century and they established Jabaliya. And later on at the North side of the old city, there was another two neighborhoods, one small, and one larger than the first one. The first one is Rasheed it's also named by Rasheed city in Egypt, because actually there is also a connection between Jaffa and Egypt. When Ibrahim Pasha came to Palestine and they occupied the Arab land and he wanted to build a new Arab State back then at the thirties of the 19th century. So Rasheed was actually named by the city of Rasheed in Egypt.

It was a small neighborhood, mainly by fishermen. And the buildings of this neighborhood actually remained, despite the destruction that was in 1936 and 1948. This neighborhood was destroyed, but not a hundred percent. That's why we can see until these days few buildings of this neighborhood.  At the North side of this neighborhood was actually the famous neighborhood of Manshiyya. Manshiyya was established also at the seventies of the 19th century.

This neighborhood was very famous because it flourished and became like a small town. It had many schools. The mosque that was built later on between 1914 and 1916 by the name of Hassan Beck, the Turkish governor, and inside the neighborhood there were mainly Palestinian Arabs, citizens and a few Jewish who lived there also. They actually also built a small hospital back then they called it Hadassa Manshiyya and later on they transferred it to Tel Aviv city. And we had also schools, as I mentioned, an Italian school that was functioning until 1948.

 So Manshiyya was one of the biggest neighborhoods in the North side of Jaffa. And also we can connect it with the center side of Jaffa the neighborhood of Nuzha. Nuzha was a very large neighborhood, and it was actually the newest neighborhood inside of Jaffa.

The street of Nuzha was one of the beautiful streets in Jaffa and in Palestine. ‘Sharia Nuzha’ it was very clean and a lovely street inside of this area. Actually the Jaffa residents started to build not only buildings for residents and hotels. They started to build also theaters.

One of the famous is cinema el Hamra that was built lately. The latest one, which was built on the forties and they had another, we had another two or three cinemas or theaters, like Cinema Rasheed, Cinema Nabil. Near Cinema el Hamra there was a small one Cinema Farruq and actually Sharia Nuzha was the Champs-Élysées of Jaffa.

Kristel: And Ramy, in the beginning of the 20th Century there were several agreements between the European powers, like the Sykes-Picot agreement and the Balfour declaration, that promised a Jewish homeland in Palestine and of course there was the influx of Jewish immigrants in Palestine. How did all of that change the character of Jaffa?

Ramy: Sykes-Picot actually came to divide the Arab land. As I mentioned, that was under control of the Ottoman Empire. There were no borders back then. Actually the French and the British came and entered those borders that we know until these days. For example, when they entered, the Palestinian could go to Lebanon, but still there was a border between Palestine and Lebanon and a checkpoint that wasn't there before the British came.

The Balfour declaration actually is connected to the Sykes-Picot because when they made Sykes-Picot, the Jewish took advantage of Sykes Picot, and it was at the same time, Sykes-Picot in 1916, Balfour declaration in 1917. And San Remo, I have to mention it, came actually to make this agreement official and to make it realistic.

So they took Balfour declaration seriously. And they started actually to work with it, to cooperate with the declaration.  So this actually gave the Jewish movement, the Zionism movement, the advantage to bring immigrants to Palestine. And they started actually before Sykes-Picot, they started at the end of the 19th century. They had five immigration waves in a row until the 30th of the 20th century.

So they started to enter Palestine, even at the Ottoman era.

Kristel: How was the relation between the new Jewish immigrants and the residents of Jaffa originally? 

Ramy: We don’t know, actually the relation between the new Jewish immigrants and the residents of Jaffa originally, because the Jewish immigrants came with their own language and they didn't even know Hebrew. They didn't study Hebrew because they studied it in Tel Aviv. When they became Hebrew, they actually started to coexist with Arabs. But it wasn't that much intensively because they had their own project because they came in order to live as a Jewish, not as a mixed immigrant or as a mixed society.

So actually at the twenties of the 20th century, we started to find out that there was actually cooperation between the Palestinian Arabs and the immigrants, but in a small percentage. For example the Citrus Committee was actually a Palestinian Arab Committee, but recently the Jewish entered those committees and they started to become a member of these committees.

And later they open their own committees. So actually the relation wasn't that strong, but despite that, there was no hatred between the two sides until the twenties of the 20th Century. 

Kristel: Did Jaffa have a Jewish community before the Zionist immigration started to take off?

Ramy: Yes. Jaffa had a Jewish community before Zionist immigration started to take off.

That's why the Zionists mentioned Jaffa, in order to bring the new immigrants to Jaffa through Jaffa's harbor. So actually there was a Jewish community, but not that large, inside of Jaffa. And sometimes they mentioned inside the old city of Jaffa, when they started to build the new neighborhoods, actually there was a Jewish neighborhood which called Florentine.

Kristel: Can you tell a little bit more about the response of Palestinians to the changes, the coming of the British and the growing number of Jewish people? What did they do when they realized that these immigrants were not coming to live with them, but to replace them?

Ramy: Also, this question is very large because we're talking about many years back then at the 20th century, actually, when the British started ruling inside Palestine, the first three years was actually military rule, 1917 until 1920.

And in 1920 they established the Mandate when they took their own permit from the, back then the UN, and they gave themselves the Mandate actually in 1920, and they started to give a green light to the Jewish immigrant to enter Palestine to Jaffa and to Haifa’s harbors.

So the Palestinian at the beginning didn't have any option to protest, but their protests wasn't acceptable by the British. Because the British actually came to make sure that Balfour declaration will become reality. Later on they gave the Zionists power to control. So they didn't care about the Palestinian revolution or before the revolution they didn't care about their protests. Actually, the Palestinian leadership were protesting every time and they went to London several times, they organized a lot of meetings with the Palestinians themselves, and sometimes with the Arab leaders and Arab politicians.

So this is their first act of response. This is their first protest. It was peaceful protest until 1933. In 1933 in Haifa it started to become non peaceful acts, Sheikh Izzeldin al Qasam, back then he left Syria because the French wanted to kill him or to arrest him. So he ran away from Syria and he came to Haifa and he established a small group of Palestinians with a few shotguns.

 And they started to fight against the British troops. So this actually was the first revolution against the British. Later on he was shot dead near the village of Ya’abad and the Palestinians back then, they didn't afraid. They actually took advantage of the act of Izzeldin al Qasam and on 1936 they opened their own revolution. And they stroke for many days and they started to attack also the British troops. So this was the second action of the Palestinians.  And the Palestinian revolution ended on 1939 when the Arab leaders in Jordan and the Gulf and everywhere, they started to persuade the Palestinian leadership that Great Britain is not our enemy and they will help us to have our own independent state.

So they make their effort to stop the Palestinian revolution and they did it and they were succeed and the Palestinian revolution didn't achieve anything because also the British were so cruel against the Palestinians, even those who weren't with guns or knives, and they started to punish everyone and they punished also the leadership, for example, they banned the Palestinian leadership, Husseini and other leaders. So actually Palestine was leftover from 1939.

Kristel: So when the Zionist movement started to organize themselves more and more and the militias became more active in attacking Palestinian communities. How did that affect the situation in Jaffa, how did the Palestinians in Jaffa organize themselves? 

Ramy: Well, actually the Zionist movement organized themselves military in 1920, Hagana they call themselves Hagana: defense.

They established this group in Tel-Aviv in 1920. And this was the continuation of their own groups that actually were established inside their own projects, their own settlements. When they started building settlements during the Ottoman regime they actually started to establish their own groups in order to protect their settlements. They started back then they called themselves ‘Hashomer Hatzair’ and they started to expand their own groups that were actually only for defending, but as I mentioned in 1920, they established Hagana. 

In Jaffa, the Palestinians in Jaffa weren't organized. It's not that they didn't want to, but it’s because the British Mandate forbid them. They actually didn't give them any chance to establish, like the Jewish troops, the Zionist troops.

It was illegal to the Palestinians because the British didn't want them to establish military groups. So the Arabs actually had their own guns, but they weren't practiced that much like the Jewish. And during the First World War the Palestinian Arabs didn't serve like the Jewish. They fought against the Ottomans. And the Jewish also fought against the Ottomans, but they were inside the British troops, the Arabs were against the Ottomans, when they made the Arab revolution back then at 1917, they weren't trained as the Jewish trained inside of the British troops. 

So actually, the Arabs didn't have the specialty and they didn't have the experience as the Jewish had inside of the British Army. So it began from that point. So later on when the Palestinian revolution started to fight against the Jewish and against the British in 1936, those who were fighting, they had simple guns. They didn't have new guns, for example.  They weren't like a military and they were groups, they weren't one united group. So Jaffa wasn't actually organized militarily. Only at the beginning of 1948, as I mentioned at the first part, Jaffa residents and Jaffa leaders knew that the resolution of the UN back then on November 1947 is making Jaffa as an island.

So they understood that Jaffa will be under attack. And actually the Jewish started to attack even before the partition decision. Before the partition decision, the Jewish troops were organized many years ago. And actually the Zionist movement started to build the settlements even before the British came. For example, at the Southeast of Jaffa Rishon LeTsyion and Holon were established at the eighties of the 19th century. Only Bat Yam established during the British mandate, 1923, I guess. Jaffa became like an island and when 1948 started after the resolution, so Jaffa actually was isolated by Bat Yam, Holon and Rishon LeTsyion and the neighborhoods of Tel-Aviv at Northeast and Tel Aviv, also the north side of Jaffa. 

So if we mentioned 1948, actually very late Jaffa was under siege. Jaffa was attacked by the Zionist troops from the three sides. And I mentioned that maybe at the first part, they didn't have any chance, but they fought the Jaffa residents and Arabs who came to fight in Jaffa.

They fought against the Jewish troops. Despite that the British were still in Palestine, but they were actually like neutral power.  Jaffa was fighting from the beginning of the 1948 until the end of April 1948. And when they didn't have the chance actually, they packed up and they left Jaffa because actually the Jaffa residents started leaving Jaffa because they understood that they under siege and no one can help them.

Even the Arab troops who came later on, they didn't come before the declaration of Israel. And when they came, they couldn't come to Jaffa because between Jaffa and Jerusalem, the Arabic land let's call it, or the Arabic state of Palestine by the UN resolution; they couldn't enter because actually the Jewish took control over the road between Jaffa and Jerusalem.

So that's why Jaffa was occupied by the Jewish troops after the Arab troops left, those who defended Jaffa from January until the end of April.

Kristel: What happened to Jaffa in 1948, the year that went into the history books as the disaster for the Palestinian people, the Nakba?

Jaffa until 1948 had 120,000 residents. We can divide them to the residents of Jaffa and the rest of the area, which we call it ‘saknat’, it's like neighborhoods and also the villages.

So total of the area of Jaffa, the County of Jaffa, were actually 120,000 residents, mainly Arab Palestinians. This was including the Jewish also. So when the Jewish troops, the Zionist troops took control over Jaffa at the beginning of May 1948, after the defenders left Jaffa, they took control over Jaffa.

And they saw that not everyone left Jaffa, not everyone could leave Jaffa, actually. The elderly didn't leave, the sick people didn't leave. The poor people didn't leave. And sometimes a few people took decision and they said that they will stay. Even if the Jewish will control, they want to stay in their homeland, regardless of those who will take control.

 After the control of the Jewish, the number of the residents became less than 4,000 Arab Palestinians. And they were under the military control of the Zionist movement, which became ‘Tzahal’. They call it in Hebrew ‘the military defense of Israel’, and they took control over Jaffa for one and a half years, maybe two years.

So actually Jaffa became like a ghetto. They gathered them, by the way, inside the Ajami neighborhood. That was one of the neighborhoods that was easy to control maybe for them because they destroyed Al Manshiyya and those who run away from the fire, they went to the sea or they went south to Ajami.

They put all of the Arab residents inside of Ajami neighborhood and actually Jaffa became part of the Israeli State and under the military control until the beginning of 1950. After 1948, few of the Arab residents, Palestinian ones, stayed in Jaffa. 

Kristel: And what happened after 1948, to the refugees, but also to the people who stayed in Jaffa?

Ramy: The refugees mainly went to Gazastrip, as I mentioned, Jabaliya. Those who came at the 19th century, they went back to Gaza, though they said to themselves, we are Jaffa residents. And few of them went to Lebanon, through the sea. And part of them went to the East side, though the East side was very difficult because the Israeli troops actually took control over the main road between Jaffa and Ramla and later on to Jerusalem. 

So the villages of Jaffa, like Abbasiyya, Yazur actually were occupied at the same time and they took control over those villages and the roads between Jaffa and those villages and the roads between Jaffa and Ramla city. Ramla city was under the Jordanian control until July 1948.

So those who could leave Jaffa to Ramla or to Ramallah weren't that much. But one of those left from Jaffa to Ramallah was for example my grandfather, from my mother's side, he took the truck and they fixed the truck. When he couldn't go to the Seaport, there was no place for him and for his family, so he decided to leave to the East side of Palestine.  My grandmother had her family in Gaza, but she actually told my grandfather that she wanted to go to her family in Ramallah. It wasn't a very big family, not like in Gaza. So they decided to go to Ramallah and they left to Ramallah back then on April 1948.

What happened after 1948, as I mentioned, the refugees went to everywhere, everywhere that you can imagine. But mainly through the Seaport to Gaza and to Lebanon, those who stayed as I mentioned less than 4,000, after the military control left, they opened the ghetto and they brought the Jewish families to stay inside the Arabic Palestinian houses.

Those who fled, and those who ran away, those who were afraid, those who became refugees, but those were actually the owners of those lands and those properties and those buildings. 

The Jewish immigrants came and entered those buildings and lands and territories and houses.

 And actually Jaffa became a mixed city, a mixed city with a big majority of Jewish and a small minority of Arabs. And those Arab Palestinians stayed in Jaffa. They took the citizenship from the Atate of Israel and they became by the international law, they became citizens in order not to keep them as refugees because they're inside their own land and inside their own city.

And they started to live the new reality, the bitter reality, they became citizens, but they weren't equal until these days, by the way, the State of Israel is looking at us as, sometimes as enemy and sometimes as a second degree resident or citizen.

Kristel: Ramy, what can you say about Jaffa today? About the people who live there, the number of Jewish people and Palestinians, what are their religious denominations?

Ramy: Today, Jaffa is a mixed city, as I mentioned, two third of it is Jewish and one third is Arab. If you can divide it, the Jewish are like over 30,000 residents, the Arabs, it's like 20,000 Arab citizens of Jaffa. From those 20,000 we have at least 16,000 Muslims and the rest is Christians. And inside the Christians we have also the separation. We have the Greek Orthodox, the largest community. And second community is the Roman Catholic and the third one is the Greek Catholic and there are a few families from the Maronite church and also from the Coptic Church.

And the Anglican Church was actually abandoned in 1948, despite it wasn't a Palestinian Arab church. It actually belonged to the British, but they left it, they left the hospital, the English hospital, they left the church and they left the CMS School. Until these days we don't know why. And one of their properties was actually sold for a Jewish French guy who bought the hospital itself. The hospital is not functioning since 1948, but the building still exists. And it's a very big and beautiful building, which is in the main street of El Hilwe.

 The municipality of Jaffa, by the way was closed, of course in 1948. And the Jewish took control over the building. The building was built by the mayor of Jaffa in 1919; Hassan Bek Said, I'm in touch with his grandson, he lives in Cairo. He told me about the story of his grandfather who built this building for his family and for the municipality.

He even took a loan back then and the British wanted to take advantage in order to give him a loan. And they told him if you want to cooperate with us. So he refused of course, because he was a nationalist person and he was well accepted by the residents of Jaffa, the Palestinian ones. And he became the mayor of Jaffa until the thirties of the 20th century.

When the revolution came, the situation became bad. And he left his position. And later on another three came. The last one was Yousef Haykal. So actually, when the Jewish took control over Jaffa, they took control also of the municipality building and they transferred it to offices.

And those days it's the offices of Halamish Company. It's a company that actually functioning for the issue of residents, the public residents. Since 1950, we don't have any more a municipality. It became Tel-Aviv-Jaffa Municipality. So actually they took control over the lands of Jaffa, everything you imagine, the lands, the buildings, the houses, everything they took control over it.

We can say they stole it. Even if the owners left, they stole it. They won't sell it even. For example, if a Palestinian wants to buy his grandfather's building, they won't sell it. They will say, no, it's our property now. And we won't sell it. Or sometimes they will say, no, it's a historical property. We won’t to sell it. Because they know if they will make this step, they will open a gate for the Palestinians to come back and even to, not to take it free, but to buy it. So this is the main issue of the Palestinian Nakba that the Israeli are refusing, until these days they are refusing to give back the lands and they are also refusing even to sell it back. So imagine what kind of regime we're talking about. 

Kristel: Jaffa is so beautiful, it is a very touristic place. But in what way can the Palestinians in Jaffa benefit from the tourism? 

Ramy: Zero, we don't have any benefit of the touristic movement, for example, in the clock tower, there was a ‘kishle’ the Ottoman prison that was actually a few years ago transferred to very luxurious hotel.

For example, this hotel is not serving anything. The citizens of Jaffa, the residents of Jaffa, we don't have any benefit from it. They are taking benefit from this building. They don't have even Arab clerk. They don't have Arab officers or any official position. A few hundred meters to the South side, the French hospital was also transferred to a hotel, the same thing, zero benefit.

The tourists who came to Jaffa until 2020 before the Corona virus started, they were entering Jaffa and Jerusalem and everywhere, but Jaffa residents didn't have any benefit from them because they were actually entering the touristic area, which is controlled by the Jewish and the Arab resident, Palestinian resident, they didn't take benefit from it. 

Kristel: When people come to visit, where can they reach out to make sure they go see Jaffa with a Palestinian guide and eat Palestinian food in Palestinian restaurants? 

Ramy: Few years ago, those who are aware of the Palestinian issue started to take advantage of this issue. And they started to study the history of Jaffa and they started also to guide. Few years ago and it was actually a very good step. I'm one of them. In 2009 my friend, Sami Abu Shahada, who started before me to guide, he told me “I have two groups today. I will give you one group and then I'll take the second group. I want you to give them guidance to the city.” I told him, I don't know a lot. He told me, just take them to the old city and you will make sure that you will tell them everything about the church and the mosque and everything that you can see.

Since then I started to read, to read and to read.  And from that time until today I passed like dozens of guiding groups. I guided in three languages in Arabic, Hebrew and English. I have also friends who are doing the same thing. This is actually a lot where I'm making the 10, 12 years ago in order to show the people, the Palestinian story, the Palestinian reality, the Palestinian history. 

And of course, if you come to Jaffa, you don't have a lot, actually, because they destroyed the old city. They destroyed two thirds of the old city, but we can show them the monuments that I mentioned in the first part of this program. Inside the old city, we have the Sarraya Theater, we have the church of St. Peter, we have the Church of St. Michael, the Greek Orthodox St. Peter, the Roman Catholic. We have two mosques functioning; the mosque of the Sea mosque, the Ahmadiyya’s mosque is the big one near the clock tower.  The clock tower is very famous. Anyone can take photos near it. Unfortunately at the east side of it, mostly demolished; the new Sarraya was destroyed on January 1948 by the Jewish troops.  And nowadays it's empty and it's not a place to visit. 

Near it the Municipality of Jaffa still closed. Once they say it will be cultural Turkish office, but still closed until these days. And the flea markets near this area and the Greek market.

Actually, this is the main things to see inside the touristic area of Jaffa, of the old city of Jaffa. But actually when I'm taking groups to tour in Jaffa, I take them also outside of the walls. We can go to see the news streets of Jaffa, for example, near the clock tower at the north side of it.

We have the new markets, Skandar Awad market, Najib Bustros. Those two were built at the end of 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. And we connect them with the Nuzha Street, with the theaters that I mentioned. So actually the tour is least one hour and they could end the tour with a Palestinian restaurant; fish and meat and everything that they want. And if they want just to sail in the sea. They had also this option. Actually, they could stay in Jaffa for at least two hours if the group wants to see a lot of monuments in Jaffa.

Kristel: I think that you can spend much more than two hours in Jaffa, I think that you can spend a full day there. It’s such a beautiful city, there is a lot to see, there’s the sea. And then you have to eat fish at the ‘Old man and the Sea’. And I’d say if anybody who is listening now is planning a visit to Jaffa in the future, just contact Ramy and see about the options to organize a tour that connects the history, heritage and the political reality of Jaffa.