Another Jaffa family out in the streets

When R. and her 5 children came home this afternoon, they found all their furniture out in the street, much of it severely damaged and broken. The doorlock had been changed.
The house owner, well known and very wealthy Jaffa property tycoon Walid Aboulafia (of bakery fame), had abused R's absence from the hovel she had been renting from him for some three years, to evict her, illegally, without a court order.
R. asked the police to come, but the sinlge police man did not help her. "There was nothing he could", do he said. R. was under so much pressure by then, that she forgot to take his details.
In fact, it is Mr. Walid Aboulafia who broke the law by evicting her illegally, without a court order.

The flat R. rented was a 2 1/2 room affair in Jaffa's Al Ajami neighborhood. Damp, it's walls blackened by fungi. In the winter the rain entered through the cracked walls. The kitchen sink was not connected to the sewage, so R. used a bucket instead.
For over a year she and her kids had their daily shower at R's mother's tiny house, as the shower in R.'s house didn't function and the owner, rich Walid Aboulafia, refused to repair it.

R. who paid a very high rent relative to the ugly state of the house she lived in, stopped paying the rent. The owner cut off her water and electricity supply. It was easy for him to do so, because in the past, the flat had been larger and he subdevided it, one assumes without a permit. As a result R. shared the electricity and water bill with her neighbors, so it was very easy to punish her.

R. started looking for a new place, but the rents in Jaffa have gone up and all she has is her social security payments. Also many houseowners want all kinds of guarantees, which when you live on social security, you cannot easily get.

The beds were literally broken, as if they had been thrown from the second floor where she lived. Maybe they were.

Due to the Ramadan, Jaffa's streets are very quiet, so we have no witnesses to the method of furniture removal. The broken aquarium says it all, i will not ask questions about the fish. Volunteers from the Islamic movement helped R. to move her stuff (or rather that part worth salvaging) to Esther's house. Esther who's always there to help each and everyone. But the damage has been done. Five children out in the streets. Next week the schoolyear starts. I wonder how R.'s children will cope. We could not find their new schoolbooks in the mess.

Ramadan, Jaffa 2009

Community involvement at the Jaffa Siksik mosque

The Siksik mosque is being renovated by the Jaffa community, in order to safeguard it as a place of prayer. It's not clear how the Keter Plastic factory, apparently at some point in the 1960-ies, managed to take over a large part of the Siksik khan and mosque, but that's what happened. They had little regard for the place and over time turned it into... a mess of partially destroyed ancient walls, new constructions out of asbestos and flimsy wooden platforms. Some of the old vaulted rooms with thick sturdy walls still stand. A 1964 report by the ministry of religion describes the building as being sound and still in use as a mosque.

The Keter founders appear to donate to the Israeli opera, culture lovers, so to say. Yet they had little regard for the lovely old mosque and khan, owned by the Siksik waqf managed by a Palestinian family still living in Jaffa.

However, the Siksiks, in cooperation with the community, are cleaning, rebuilding and repairing the mosque. Five times a day prayers are held under difficult conditions. However, each day something in the ,mosque is changed, cleaned, repaired. I think something in the community is repaired as well, through this joint effort.

The "Siksik" Mosque as a point of reference

The old sandstone Siksik mosque in Jaffa's flea market area has recently become the center of a new struggle.
The mosque, constructed in the 1880-ies, consists of a room, an elegant minaret and a lovely sabil. It's located on Siksik street (today's Beyt HaEshel street) .
It was constructed by the Siksik family, still living in Jaffa, next to the ancient khan they owned and operated. Traders on their way to the Jaffa market would stay there during the night, after the walled city's gates had been locked for its citizens' peace, quiet and security.
Up to this very day the mosque is owned by the Siksik family's "waqef" (non profit organization) and under their responsibility. Omar Siksik functions as the mosque's moutawali (caretaker), elected by the family to take care of the mosque.
The family has engaged in legal battles over the years, in order to prevent its demolition and its being taken over by the "Keter" plastic factory located just behind it on what, perhaps, once upon a time, were storage rooms of the mosque and khan. Paperwork possessed by the Siksik family indicates the existence of those storage rooms but does not exactly state their location.

The mosque has not functioned as a place of prayer for many years, but is being maintained and safeguarded by the family, until last week.
The southern section of the Islamic movement entered the mosque, cleaned it and exchanged the locks without the Siksik family's permission.
Jaffa has several active mosques and in the flea-market area has become a predominantly Jewish over the years. The problem is not a lack of prayer space. Moreover, the large "Mouhmoudiyeh", Jaffa's main mosque, is a short walk away.

So why did the southern section of the Islamic movement decide to undertake its self appointed and not very necessary mission right now?

One needs to look at the bigger picture: the construction of a hotel on top of the Jaffa "Kishle" (the old Turkish police station and jail), next door to the Mahmoudiyeh mosque.
The whole area of the clocktowersquare, kishle and mosque included, are protected buildings. When the Nakash brothers bought the Kishle building for some 38.000.000 NIS three years ago, they bought it in order to construct a hotel, and apparently they bought it with very generous building rights. Building rights that allow them to build a huge block on top of the old structures, dwarfing them and the lovely surroundings.
The construction will change the Jaffa skyline and the whole area for ever. A barbarous act of destroying cultural heritage for us and the next generations. Something carried out by money hungry, but very blind, people with no respect for another culture, architecture and art. And also lacking all respect for another religion, Islam.
The planned hotel's royal suite has a swimming pool on its balcony, overlooking the mosque's courtyard where prayers take place. How callous can you get?

Constructing a hotel next to a mosque demands a lot of respect and thoughtfulness on the side of those planning the hotel. However, thoughtfulness concerning the mosque's attendees feelings is NOT something the hotel's architects took into consideration (and i went to the city planning office to have a look at the actual plans). The fight against the hotel's construction has been taken up by the northern section of the Islamic movement.
The southern section kept quiet. Although they, as members of the Muslim council (something like the city rabbinate) should have been the first to take up the fight. So the next question should be: why didn't they? How come they did not oppose the building permits actively?
This is where the rumors start: some suggest money was handed over, or in less nice words, bribes were paid.
The southern section kept quiet. But now they must show they DO care about mosques and religion, which may be the reason why they targeted the Siksik mosque for their activity.

Yesterday some 100 people came to pray at the mosque, in order to express their support for the Siksik family's fight to keep it what it is, a mosque, a peaceful place of prayer.

Fighting for Jaffa, together

The settlers who wish to turn Jaffa into a Jewish only city, have in essence caused a complete coalition of many Jaffa organizations who prior to this threat never cooperated.
The call was for a joint struggle of Palestinians and Jews against the settlers, who actively threaten the good relationship in the neighbourhood. And to do so by peaceful and democratic means.
At 17.00 all met close to the area where the yeshiva guys bought a plot of land, where there used to be a market serving all of Jaffa's population.
Among the speakers were Omar Siksek, member of the municipal council, Sheikh Anwar Dake of the southern section of the Islamic movement, lawyer Haled of the Muslim Council, SheIkh Abu Ajwe of the northern section of the Islamic movement, Gabi of the Christian club, Knesset member Dov Khenin, Hana Amoury of the popular committee, municipal council member Ahmad Mashrawi, Ilan and Noga of Ofek Hadash, who carried out a research on the ways of functioning of so called "Garinim Toraniim" and several other settler organizations.
The Israel Land Administration is a public body, managing land owned by the public. When they sell lands, they cannot do so to an exclusive group, as per high court decision (Bagatz Ka'aden).
In Jaffa, the sale of public land is sensitive, for two main reasons:
Originally this land belonged to Palestinians. In 1948-1949 it was declared "absentee" property and handed over to the state.
Some 13 years ago a contract was made (and authorized in the Tel Aviv district court) between the housing ministry and Jaffa's Palestinian community according to which the housing ministry undertook it to create 400 housing units for the community, which suffers from a severe housing crisis.
So far 27 flats have been constructed out of 400.....
The "Etrog" plot is one of the last large publicly owned plots on which a large number of flats can be constructed. Most other pubic plots are smaller which makes it less easy for public housing or affordable housing for the poor Palestinian community.
The Israel Land Administration sold the Etrog Plot to a Bemuna, a company owned by a Hebron settle , who explicitly state "they will sell flats only to religious nationalist Jews".
Were-checked this by registering and calling, interesting in buying a housing unit in the new project. "We" being 2 activists, a muslim social worker and a secular Jewish researcher. They met with blunt refusal. In other cou ntries this would be called blunt racism.

The Settlers have arrived – the struggle is just beginning

What?

Protest tent against the new housing project for the national-religious public in the heart of Ajami neighborhood in Jaffa.

When?05/06/09, at 17:00,

Where?

At the site of the Jabaliye Market, HaEtrog st. corner of Mendes France st.

Why?

On May 7th 2009, the Bemuna Company won the bid to purchase land for the building of 20 housing units dedicated to the Jewish national-religious public in Ajami neighborhood – the heart of Arab Jaffa.
Bemuna also declared that “this was only the beginning” and that its efforts for the Judaization of Jaffa would include the further construction of 200 housing units. This project can be added to the already active ‘garin torani’ and ‘yeshivat hesder’ which, under the banner of ‘strengthening’ the Jewish communities in mixed cities and retaining the city’s Jewish sanctity, have already begun to envelop its streets.
Research gathered displays a worrying number of people fresh from the settlement and Greater Israel movements, who are active in a scheme aimed at ‘Judaizing the mixed cities of Israel’ with the simultaneous displacement of Arab residents – a project which has already had some ‘success’ in Acca, Lud and Ramle. These groups are funded by external financiers but are also supported by the state of Israel itself and by the municipality of Tel Aviv. They have adopted the same ‘setting facts on the ground’ approach used so extensively by the settler movement based in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
In light of this danger, and under the slogan “Jaffa is in Danger! Our strength is our Unity”, all the groups and committees active in Jaffa have come together in order to build a common strategy to fight this phenomenon. This coalition will be active on the community, the public and the media in order to recruit supporters, both from within Jaffa and outside, in the struggle to prevent the ‘expansion of the settlement’ in our city.
We will not be silent! We will not accept the Judaization of Jaffa!
Partners in the coalition:
The Popular Committee for Land and Housing Rights in Jaffa, the Rabita, the Jaffa List, the Southern and Northern Islamic Movements, the Islamic Council, the Orthodox Society, the Ajami Neighborhood Committee, the Jaffa municipal council members and other public figures.
For further details: Hana - 054-4486667