Introducing Israel: Second Revised Edition
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Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Joan Comay, Introducing Israel: Second Revised Edition, bahai-library.com.
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In this series                     INTRODUCING
INTRODUCING AMERICA
by Barbara Kreutz and Ellen Fleming
INTRODUCING GERMANY
by Michael Winch
INTRODUCING GREECE
Israel
edited by Francis King                             by
INTRODUCING SPAIN                            Joan Comay
by Cedric Salter
INTRODUCING YUGOSLAVIA                          With a foreword by
by Lovett F. Edwards
David Ben-Gurion

METHUEN & CO LTD
11 New Fetter Lane, London, E.C.4
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First published in the U.S.A. with the title Everyone's Guide to Israel
First published in Great Britain 1963
Copyright© 1962 Joan Comay
Second Revised Edition 1969
Copyright © 1969 Joan Comay                                                                     To Michael
Printed in Great Britain
by Cox & Wyman Ltd, Fakenham, Norfolk
SBN 416 26300 3 (hardback edition)
SBN 416 12500 x (paperback edition)

This book is available in both hardback and paperback
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be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated with-
out the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding
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without a similar condition including this condition
being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
INTRODUCING ISRAEL

the vaulted roof is a fine example of Crusader architecture.
Part of a hexagonal chapel stands near the original landing
stage. This was one of three chapels attached to a large round
church similar to the mother church of the Order in J eru-
salem. When the English Bishop Pococke visited the area in                             CHAPTER ELEVEN
the eighteenth century, church and chapels, though ruined,
were still standing, and in his travel account he wrote of the                                Haifa
' . . . fine lofty church of ten sides built in slightly Gothic
taste.'                                                            In I 898, Dr Theodor Herzl came sailing across the sparkling
Since Athlit is in a military security area, would-be          water of Haifa Bay, moved to tears at his first sight of the
visitors should first confirm whether they could have access       Holy Land. He was thirty-eight years old, and already
to the ruins.                                                      becoming a legend as the Messianic J>.rophet of an inter-
In the Carmel hills overlooking the coast at Athlit is the     national Zionist Movement.
abandoned Arab village of Ein Hod, now converted into a               Then, coming to the small, still primitive town of Haifa,
picturesque artists' colony, of which Marcel Janco, one of         with its few hundred Jews, its colony of German Templars,
Israel's leading painters, is the founder. Haifa Municipality      and its Arabs riding on camels and donkeys, his soaring
has provided it with electricity and water, and the small          imagination converted it into a great modern metropolis,
stone house-studios have charming patches of flowers and           with the ships of many nations thronging its docks, thousands
patios and a view of the ocean. In the restaurant-cafe, gay        of white homes up the mountainside, and even a funicular
with murals, the villagers and the visitors relax together.        railway mounting to the top of the Carmel. On his return
There is a gallery, where the artists' pictures and ceramics are   from Palestine, he started work on his novel, Altneuland (Old
exhibited and sold.                                                New Land), which was completed in I902, and described
From here, Mount Carmel closes in on the sea, forming          in detail his vision of the future port city in a future Jewish
the headland behind which lies the curve of Haifa Bay.             State.
Herzl's city of tomorrow is now a city of today - the
second largest in Israel, draped in shining white from the
pine forests at the top of the Carmel to the edge of the
Mediterranean.
As a harbourage, Haifa has no known Biblical past. Other
coastal towns with easier land access developed to the south
of the Carmel Range (Caesarea, Jaffa, Ashdod, and Gaza),
and to the north (Acre and the Phoenician ports of Tyre and
Sidon). Recent excavations in a tel to the south of the city,
called Shikmona, indicate that there was Jewish settlement
here as far back as the time of the Romans. It was only in the
INTRODUCING ISRAEL                                                         HAIFA                         229

last half-century of Turkish rule, prior to World War I, that     Haifa never got used to the anguish of these trans-ship-
the port and town started to grow, stimulated by the German     ments, or to the crowd of weeping relatives and friends
Templar Colony established in the 1860s, and the narrow-        pressing against the military barriers at the port. Then,
gauge railway line built by the Turks in 1905, with German      suddenly, the Mandate was no more, and Haifa was the wide-
help, to link up with the Hedjaz railway from Damascus to       open door to the Jewish State.
Mecca.                                                            Through it came a great stream of D.P.s and immigrants.
It was the British who really developed Haifa as a modern    For them the excited moment of home-coming was when they
seaport, oil refining centre and naval base after their con-    packed the deck in the early morning to watch the rosy top
quest of Palestine from the Turks in 1918. But the birth of     of Mount Carmel rise out of the sea, and hail the pilot's
Israel in 1948 cut Haifa off from the Arab hinterland. The      launch riding out to meet them ('a Jewish pilot', they told
Hedjaz railway branch-line was severed, and so was the oil      each other, 'in a Jewish launch!').
pipeline from Iraq. Jordan's trade was diverted through
Beirut, the refineries were shut down, and the British Navy         As the country's one big seaport, and the dominant city
steamed away for good. There were at that time many who           in the north, Haifa was a glittering prize in the fighting
expected Haifa to wither like a sawed-off branch. The oppo-      of 1948. Actually, its possession was dramatically settled in
site has happened. As Israel's only modern deep-water             the strange period of the Arab-Jewish sub-war between the
harbour, Haifa had to go on developing rapidly to keep           UN Partition decision at the end of November 1947, and the
pace with the phenomenal econmnic growth of the new               birth oflsrael in the middle of May 1948.
State, while it has once again become an oil tenninal and            The turning point came on 2 1 April, when the British
refining centre, on the basis of a new pipeline from Eilat.       Commander-in-Chief, General Stockwell, announced that
In an average year the port has been handling about            his troops, getting ready to embark, had given up further
twelve hundred ocean-going vessels, 80 per cent of the goods     responsibility for Haifa and withdrawn into the harbour
going in or out of Israel, and over 230,000 passengers.          area.
Haifa's most important business is ships, and its most            Under cover of darkness, four small Haganah columns
poignant moments in the struggle for independence were           advanced towards key points in the city - the telephone
connected with ships of a special kind - the small and           exchange, the Government office building, the railway
shabby vessels that tried to bring Jewish refugees to the        station, and the Arab headquarters. Fighting continued all
forbidden shores of the Promised Land. But most of them          next morning, with tremendous crashes from the Jewish
were boarded by British naval vessels when they reached          home-made mortars called 'Davidkas' (little Davids), but
territorial waters and towed into Haifa harbour, where their     the tide swung in favour of the Jews when the Arab com-
'passengers' were disembarked and dragged straight on to         mander and his aides fled. General Stockwell stepped in to
waiting prison ships with deck areas caged in by wire, in        arrange a truce, and the Jewish commander offered the Arab
which they were shipped out again to the detention camps in      population full safety and equal rights, provided that they
Cyprus - in the case of the Exodus, all the way back to          handed over their arms and all the foreigners fighting for
Germany, a story that made world front-page news.                them. The local Arab notables were at first willing to accept
INTRODUCING ISRAEL                                                        HAIFA

these terms, but after a few hours they sorrowfully declared      mel); and at the top is Har ha-Carmel (Mount Carmel).
that they had to submit to orders from their national leaders ,   The quickest way from 'downtown' to the suburbs on top of
who insisted that the whole Arab population of Haifa should       the Carmel is by the Carmelit, Haifa's tilted subway, which
leave rather than settle down peacefully in a Jewish-con-         whirls you up at a preposterous angle in less than ten
trolled city.                                                     minutes.
British police reports give a terse official account of the       The main business thoroughfare, running in the reclaimed
deliberate self-exile of the local Arabs, at a time when the      area adjoining the harbour, used to be known as Kingsway,
fighting was over in Haifa. Similar evacuations from Jaffa,       but has been renamed Independence Road. The street crowd
Tiberias, and elsewhere steadily swelled a refugee problem        is a colourful and amiable mixture of seamen off the ships,
which remains unresolved to this day.                             port officials and dock workers, young men and women in
On 30 June the final British contingent embarked, the          trim naval uniform, businessmen parleying over endless cups
last remaining figure on the quayside being a Brigadier-          of Turkish coffee or glasses of lemon tea, tourists, Arabs and
General who stood stiffiy at the salute, while the bugles rang    Druze in flowing robes, and khaki-clad kibbutzniks, hurrying
out and the Union Jack was furled. Thus the final curtain         from the bus station with the inevitable ancient brief-cases in
rang down on British rule which had been so gallantly             their hands.
ushered in thirty years earlier, when Allenby's army came            Two prominent buildings on the seaward side are the
marching in from the south. The Mandate had ended, to use         Dagon grain silo and the huge Government Hospital, to the
T. S. Eliot's words, 'not with a bang but a whimper'.             south of which are the Bat Galim and Carmel bathing
beaches. The silo is one of the tallest buildings in Israel and
In its human atmosphere as well as in its natural setting,     one of the most beautiful. It is worth visiting, for the view
Haifa is quite different from the ageless serenity of Jerusalem   from the top and for its small museum tracing the history of
or the brash bustle of Tel Aviv. Haifa men pride themselves       wheat and flour in the Holy Land from Biblical times.
on being down-to-earth, civic-minded folk. During the most           From the station, Carmel Avenue sweeps up through the
trying times, Arab and Jewish city councillors, merchants,        old German Colony, with its solidly-built gabled houses,
professional men, and workers managed to remain friends           many of them still bearing inscriptions above their doors in
with each other, and with the local British officials. This       old Gothic letters. Pross's restaurant, which dates back to
tolerant and progressive air has remained unchanged since         the last century, still provides a good and substantial meal.
the State, under the brisk rule of a Labour Party mayor,          The former German residents of this quarter, descendants
Abba Khoushy, who is apt to check on the street cleaners at       of the original Templar settlers, were deported by the
dawn, forbids drivers to honk their horns, permits public         British authorities as enemy aliens at the beginning of World
transport on the Sabbath, and has planted pink oleanders          War II and have never come back. (A number of them now
down the centre of the main approaches to the town.               live in Australia.)
Haifa is built like a three-decker sandwich. The lower
town contains the dock area and the business centre; up             Hadar ha-Carmel has rather steep and congested streets,
the slopes is the Hadar ha-Carmel (the Beauty of the Car-         but it is pleasant to stroll along Herzl Street and to have
INTRODUCING ISRAEL                                                         HAIFA                            233
coffee and wonderful pastries at one of its pavement cafes,    Israel that settled in this part of the country in the period of
which have a Viennese air about them.                          the Judges. (Their emblem was a galley with a square sail
The handsome City Hall on Bialik Street houses in one       and banks of oars.) The silted mouths of two small rivers,
wing a gallery of modern art and an archaeological museum,     the Kshon and the Na'aman, had turned the area into a
which should be visited for its Roman and Byzantine exhibits   malarial swamp, until it was drained and reclaimed by
mainly from Caesarea, and for a noteworthy collection          Jewish settlers more than forty years ago.
of ancient local coins. From the Memorial Garden in front,        The most conspicuous plant in this Haifa Bay area is the
one looks down upon the harbour. The two old Turkish           oil refinery, with its giant concrete cooling-vats, fretwork
cannon standing here are a survival of a fort that once        metal superstructure, and shining tanks. Other large enter-
guarded the town.                                              prises concentrated in the industrial zone produce chemicals
High up on the mountainside stands the most arresting       and fertilizers, assembled cars and trucks, textiles, steel, glass,
object in Haifa, the Bahai Shrine, with its gleaming golden    cement, and soap.
dome. The whole slope below it right down to the German
Colony is a terraced Persian Garden, through which runs        Mount Carmel
a stairway lined by cypress-trees. The garden is being con-       There can be few more attractive residential districts
tinued upward behind the Shrine, so that the whole effect      anywhere than Har ha-Carmel, the top of the Carmel Range.
will be that of a woven Persian carpet spread down the         It is an area of ridges and woody ravines, sunlit boulders and
mountainside from top to bottom. To one side of the domed      pine-trees, summer breezes, and glorious views of the
building is another one modelled on the Greek Parthenon,       Mediterranean and the Galilee highlands, with the white cap
to house a museum and archives.                                of distant :Mount Hermon floating over the eastern horizon
The Bahai faith, founded in Persia in I844, upholds the     on a clear day. The heavy dew keeps this a verdant oasis
unity of God and takes its inspiration from the Old and New    even in the dry, hot summer, and the very name 'Carmel'
Testaments as well as the Koran. It has no priesthood but      (which means the Vineyard of the Lord) suggests the blend of
attempts to adapt basic religious truths to modern needs.      fertility and religion which belongs to the mountain. From
Haifa is the world centre of the religion, which now has       earliest times mystery shrouded the habitation of the Carmel.
several million adherents scattered over many countries.       Its high places held the altars of strange gods and its hidden
The Panorama Road intersects the Bahai Garden above         places the sanctuaries of fugitives and hermits.
the Shrine and winds up to the top of the Carmel, with a
And though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel,
more breathtaking vista opening up at each dizzy curve.
I will search and take them out thence. (Amos 9:3)
Looking down from this vantage point, one gets a clear idea
of the planned development of the Haifa Bay area between       Above all there broods over it the memory of that fierce old
Haifa city and Acre. It now contains a number of Israel's      man of God, Elijah, and his war against idolatry.
major industrial plants, surrounded by housing projects for      The Bible tells us, in the First Book of Kings, that after a
workers and immigrants set in green belts. The plain was       three-year drought which God had sent to punish King
known as the Valley of Zebulun, after the seafaring tribe of   Ahab and the Israelites for their pagan cult, the Prophet
234                 INTRODUCING ISRAEL                                                            HAIFA                          235
Elijah gathered together on Mount Carmel 450 priests of                  The Technion has an enrolment of 5,000 full-time students,
Baal and 2,000 priests of Astarte and proved by a miracle            of whom 7 per cent are women - a high percentage for a
that their gods did not exist. Elijah built an altar for sacrifice   technological university. There are two courses of thirty-two
as did the other priests, but Baal did not come to the altar          students from twelve Afro-Asian countries doing (in English)
dedicated to him, whereas God sent a fire which burnt up the          a Bachelor of Agricultural Engineering Degree. The Technion
sacrifice placed there by Elijah. As a result of this miracle the     also runs part-time refresher courses in a number of cities. It
people turned to the true God and all the idolatrous priests          turns out 600 graduates a year in general science, engineering
were put to death. Then, in answer to Elijah's prayer, came           in various branches - civil, electrical, chemical, mechanical,
rain in abundance. The place where this miracle was per-              hydraulic, and aeronautical - and architecture. On the
formed is traditionally identified with El Muhraka (the place         campus is a Junior Technical College for training building
of burning), eleven miles from Haifa, as the crow flies. The          technicians, giving a Technicians' Diploma after three and
spot where the pagan priests were then put to death is by             a half years of work. There is also the Technical High School
tradition identified with Tel el-Kuassis (the mount of the            of over one thousand pupils, offering a four-year course in
priest), at a bend in the River Kishon.                               eleven technical fields.
There are several religious institutions on the Carmel                 Also on Mount Carmel are the first buildings on the
associated with Elijah, such as the Carmelite Monastery on            campus of the Haifa University College, opened in 1967 as
the French Carmel; another small Carmelite Monastery at               an affiliate of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. It has been
El Muhraka; and a big cavern at the foot of the promontory            designed by Oscar Niemeyer, creator ofBrazilia. The college
overlooking Haifa, where the prophet took refuge.                     now teaches liberal arts and social studies to over 2,000
The main built-up area of Har ha-Carmel radiates out               students.
from the Merkaz (centre), with its bus station and its neat               The Carmelite Monastery, on top of the jutting promontory of
shops and cafes. On a bright morning it is pleasant to wander         the Western (or French) Carmel, has behind it nearly eight
on foot through the public parks, or past the villas and              centuries of history. The Order to which it belongs started
summer boarding-houses, framed in flowering shrubs. The               here on the Carmel, and obtained its official charter in 1212,
Merkaz, and near-by garden suburbs like Ahuza and Neve                with Elijah as its patron saint. Their monastery was twice
Sha'anan, have a well-ordered and relaxed feeling, and one            destroyed - and the monks put to the sword - first by
is grateful that this beautiful setting of hill and sea has not       the Arabs after the fall of Crusader Acre, and again by
been ruined by unplanned jerry-building.                               the Turks, after Napoleon's unsuccessful siege of Acre. It is
A fifteen-minute drive along a winding mountain road                not surprising that the present monastery was constructed
brings one to Technion City, the campus of the Haifa Institute         like a fortress and located at a spot chosen with an eye
of Technology oflsrael, set in 750 acres of pine forest. It has        to defence. Across the road from the monastery is the old
impressive functional buildings for its lecture halls and              lighthouse building, appropriately called Stella Maris
laboratories, a beautiful auditorium named for Sir Winston             (Star of the Sea), which now houses Israel's naval head-
Churchill by its English donors, and students' hostels with            quarters.
split-level bedroom-studies ingeniously adapted to the slope.             Not far away, dominating the ridge, is the Dan Carmel
INTRODUCING ISRAEL                                                        HAIFA

hotel, with every bedroom window framing the glorious view.       lingering echoes of primitive cavemen, pagan altars, hermits,
All the same, Haifa people regret the skyline of the mountain     and Crusaders.
being broken in this way by any building.                            Haifa has one exquisite moment which every visitor should
From the suburb of Ahuza on Mount Carmel, it is a won-         capture ifhe can. It is the sight from the top of the Carmel of
derful drive south-eastward through the pinewoods on the top      a huge orange-red sun, sinking into the sea, while a spangled
of the range to the kibbutz of Beit Oren. From here the road      veil oflights is flung along the ancient coast, from the Ladder
descends through a rugged defile to the coastal highway,          of Tyre to Caesarea.
passing the forest of Ya-arot ha-Carmel. The many caves
which pit the rock-faces along the road have held strange
tenants in their time, from Stone Age men to Byzantine
hermits.
Just before Beit Oren, a narrow side road turns off to
the two big Druze villages of lsfiya and Daliyat el-Carmel. The
handsome and dignified Druze from the Carmel move easily
around Haifa city and frequent its Oriental coffee-shops,
the men distinguished by their big cavalry moustaches.
Isfiya, which is mixed Druze and Christian-Arab, stands on
the site of the ancient Jewish village of Huseifa. A piece of a
mosaic synagogue floor has been dug up here, and depicts
a pretty garland of yellow flowers surrounding the Hebrew
inscription 'shalom al Yisrael' (Peace be unto Israel); it is
now in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, and is reproduced
in the design of the Israel one-pound note. At the end of the
main street in Daliyat el-Carmel is the house occupied in
the 'eighties of the last century by Laurence Oliphant, an
early English supporter of the Zionist ideal. The tomb of
Mrs Oliphant is in the village. Visitors to these clean and
picturesque Druze villages can enjoy a friendly cup of
Turkish coffee while they buy the gay basket-ware for which
the Druze women are noted.

Nowhere else in the world can there be the same curious
human mixture as upon the Carmel: Jewish suburbanites,
kibbutzniks, Carmelite monks, Druze, Christian Arabs,
Moslems, and Bahais - all living side by side among the
THE GALILEE                       239
century, when its loss marked the end of the Latin Kingdom
in the Holy Land.
In 1799, Napoleon's advance from Egypt round the eastern
edge of the Mediterranean was blocked at Acre. After two
CHAPTER TWELVE                                months of unsuccessful siege, he withdrew, abandoned his
whole Near-Eastern campaign, and returned to Europe. His
The Galilee                                 defeat was primarily due to British naval power, for Nelson
destroyed his fleet in the Battle of the Nile, and Sir Sydney
Western Galilee                                                  Smith captured his siege guns on their way to Acre by sea.
Running out along the northern tip of the Bay, eight miles       In I 948, in the War of Independence, Acre surrendered to
from Haifa, Acre forms a romantic frieze of bubble domes,         the Israelis after a daring amphibious landing just north of
minarets, crenellated sea-walls, and palm-trees, etched           the city.
against sky and water.                                              The Turkish style dominates the architecture of the old
No other place in Israel except Jerusalem has had a more      town. The Ottoman Governor at the end of the eighteenth
stirring history. Acre was a strategic prize from ancient times   century, Ahmed Jezzar Pasha (known as Ahmed the But-
as a sheltered harbour astride the coastal route to Phoenicia     cher), tried to restore Acre's commercial importance and to
over the Ladder of Tyre, a day's march to the north. History       make of it a 'little Constantinople'. He built the splendid
has recorded seventeen sieges of the city. As a Canaanite          Mosque of El Jezzar, using for the arcades marble columns
town it resisted capture by the Hebrews in the time ofJoshua;     brought from the Roman ruins of Caesarea farther down the
'Neither did Asher drive out the inhabitants of Accho .. .'       coast. These arcades enclose three sides of a large, sunny
Judges r : 3 r ; and more than a thousand years later, Simon      courtyard, and behind them are small domed cells for the
the Maccabee also failed to take it. In the Hellenic period,      scholars. The courtyard is paved with worn flagstones, and
it was renamed Ptolemais, and it is referred to by that name      trees and flowering shrubs spring up in the corners. The
in the account of St Paul's journey to Jerusalem (Acts 21 :7).    sundial gives it charm, and the fountains gaiety. The Mosque
But the most spectacular chapter in Acre's history was written    closes off the fourth side of the square. The Ministry of Re-
by the Crusaders.                                                 ligions has painted it and restored the ancient inscriptions.
In r r 04, after the First Crusade had secured Jerusalem,      The visitor who slips off his shoes and enters will find the
Baldwin I carried Acre by a combined land and sea assault,        proportions good, but the effect one of emptiness.
with the aid of the Genoese fleet. Its commercial importance         At the bottom of the stairs leading to the square is Ahmed
revived and it became known as Stjean d'Acre, in honour of        Jezzar's fountain, and next door, luxurious eighteenth-
the Order of the Knights of St John (the Hospitallers). It        century steam-baths, modelled on those in Cairo, and used
fell to Saladin, the Saracen leader, after he had wiped out       today as a municipal museum. Here the Turkish tiling forms
the Crusader army at the Horns of Hittin near Tiberias.           an attractive background to the collection of medieval
Richard the Lion-Heart of England re-took it, and after the       ceramics and archaeological fragments through which the
fall of Jerusalem, it remained the Crusader capital for a         tumultuous history of the city can be traced, and also to a
INTRODUCING ISRAEL

series of tableaux showing Arab and Druze village life and
costumes.
Most of the buildings in Old Acre are squeezed together
and threaded by narrow alleys, in which a rich assortment of
communities amiably rub shoulders. The population includes
nearly five thousand Christian and Moslem Arabs and twenty
thousand Jewish immigrants from a score of different coun-
tries. New immigrant quarters have spread to the east, across
the highway.
The chief meeting-place is the winding bazaar which
crosses the Old City. Here Arab pottery jars jostle plastic
cups and saucers, while in the metal-workers' street, Euro-
pean tinsmiths hammer out zinc buckets next door to Arab
coppersmiths designing the traditional coffee urns. Little
donkeys share with trucks the deliveries of fresh fruit and
vegetables, and prices are settled in a dozen different tongues.
Travellers to Palestine in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries talked of the grain trade carried on in Acre, with
two to three thousand camels arriving daily in the season
from Hauran (Syria). These have disappeared, and the
trucks piled high with produce from the fertile Galilee have
taken their place.
The most important Crusader monument is known as the
Crypt of St John. The entrance can be reached from a lane
off the bazaar. This magnificent vaulted stone hall under the
Turkish Citadel has been excavated and is now believed to
have been the refectory of the Hospitallers. At the base of
one of the big columns that support the Gothic arched roof,
a secret tunnel has been found and cleared. It leads right
through the city to the water's edge and was almost certainly
designed as a secret passageway offering the knights direct
access to their vessels from the central hall, in time of
emergency.
In the course of the clearance work, other openings were
found in the walls of this tunnel, and these led to what
THE GALILEE

appeared to be a considerable network of wider tunnels
marking the streets of the old Crusader city beneath the
current street levels. When all this is cleared, which may take
years, it will prove perhaps one of the most exciting Crusader
sites in the world.
There is also the possibility that beneath the Crusader
city is the city of Roman times, for remains of the Roman
period have already come to light.
The Citadel, whose stone walls rise sheer above the lane
leading to the so-called Crypt of St John, was built in the
eighteenth century and rests on Crusader foundations.
Before 1948, this was used as the central prison of Palestine
under the Mandate. In its dungeons were locked up captured
members of the Jewish underground resistance movement,
and tablets in the execution chamber, which serves now as a
small museum, record the names of those who were hanged.
The novel and film 'Exodus' recall the 1947 jail-break of
resistance fighters from the Acre prison. Here too are the cells
where the Bahai apostles were imprisoned by the Turks
more than half a century ago. The Citadel after 1948, looking
less grim after being repainted a soft pink colour, serves as a
Government psychiatric hospital. As new institutions are built,
the patients will be moved out and there are plans to clear the
moat and restore the Crusader citadel.
On top of the walls is a restaurant and night-club called
'Chumot Acco' (Walls of Acre). It can be approached
through a secret tunnel.
The road down to the old port passes a number ofJezzar's
cannon mounted on the sea-wall, and some captured
French pieces that Sir Sydney Smith presented to him after
the defeat of Bonaparte. The road ends at the port, now
sanded up arid shallow, with small fishing-boats riding at
anchor in the lee of a crumbling medieval tower.
Between Acre and the Lebanese border stretch twelve
miles of fertile coastal plain.
Q
242               INTRODUCING ISRAEL                                                      THE GALILEE
An avenue of eucalyptus-trees just beyond the city limits       respectable town is the remains of a Canaanite Temple that
of Acre marks the entrance to the Government Experimental          was discovered while digging the foundation of a house near
Station, where a former Turkish Khan (caravan inn), with a         the beach. A little figure of I 500 B.C. was found at the site,
spacious cobbled courtyard, now houses Israel's most               which seems to be that of Astarte, the Goddess of Fertility of
important stud farm for horses and mules.                          the Canaanites. It may be pure coincidence that Nahariya is
A mile to the north of it is the house and tomb of the          a well-known honeymoon resort.
prophet and founder of the Bahai sect, Baha-Ullah (Glory of           Farther up the coast, the Club Mediterranee has another
God), set in a beautiful flower garden. This is where he lived     centre, this time a camp on a sandy cove. The living quarters
when he was released in I892 after twenty-four years of            are little huts of woven matting, and the young men spend
imprisonment in Acre jail. The house is preserved exactly as       their time skin-diving, while the girls in bikinis concentrate
it was, and its furnishings are an odd blend of Victorian and     on their tan.
Persian.                                                             Where the highway crosses the frontier, high up the cliff,
The dramatic stone aqueduct that runs parallel to the          there are Israel and Lebanese police posts just round a bend
main road was built by J ezzar on the remains of an ancient       from each other. Hundreds of feet below, the restless water
Roman one, to bring fresh water to Acre from the Springs of       worries at the stark-black rock, hollowing out the caves which
Kabri. Each of the aqueduct's hundreds of arches is a separate    give this cape its name of Rosh ha-Nikra (Headland of the
picture-frame enclosing a vista of farms and hills, orange-       Grotto). Its ancient name was the Ladder of Tyre, after the
groves and cypress-trees, surmounted by a curved slice of         great Phoenician s~aport a little farther up the coast. Above
blue sky.                                                         the sheer cliff the armies of the ancient Pharaohs, the
On a small plateau next to the aqueduct stands a square        Assyrians, Alexander the Great, and many others threaded
museum illustrating the Nazi period. It was established by the    their way. The rusting ends of the severed railway lines above
nearby kibbutz 'Lohamei ha-ghettaot', which is composed of        the rocks are a mute symbol of the suspended relations
ghetto fighters.                                                  between Israel and Lebanon. A bright red or yellow little
Nahariya (River) gets its name from a small stream that        cable car now takes visitors down the I 10 yards of sheer
runs down the centre of the main street. With its fine beach,     cliff to the grottos down below. Rather like at Capri, the
its gardens, and its clean, pleasant pensions (boarding-         wind and waves have hollowed out the chalk rock and
houses) and cafes, it has become a popular summer resort.        created picturesque caves into which the sea rushes with a
At the beginning, Nahariya remained a stronghold of the          tremendous noise. Narrow tunnels, walks, steps and platforms
German Jews and the German language; there is an apoc-           have been cut into the rock and electric light makes it pos-
ryphal story that when the Royal Commission of I936              sible to watch the sea thundering in and out down below.
recommended a partition plan by which their town would           The walk, with a guide, through the grottos takes about
fall within the Arab State, the angry inhabitants cabled         fifteen minutes and costs about six shillings. A cafeteria has
Dr Weizmann that, come what may, 'Nahariya bleibt immer          been built at the top hanging over the sea.
Deutsch' (Nahariya remains forever German).                          On the border ridge running inland from Rosh ha-Nikra
The faintly scandalous archaeological pride of this very      there is a triangle of kibbutzim - Hanita, Matsuba and Eilon
-- Introducing Israel: Second Revised Edition (Used by permission of the curator)