I could smell the citrus groves described, hear waves splashing against the port docks, feel my bare feet hop across the granite towards the Souk-es-Salhi market while the sea wind caressed my skin. Like any vision illustrating an inaccessible location to a child, Jaffa released a mesmerising image in my mind.

 

Once a bustling port and Middle Eastern trading industry, Jaffa experienced its height as an urban, cultural and political centre in the early 20th century. It was invaded and occupied by Alexander the Great, the Crusaders, Napoleon, the Ottomans and the British.

Um Kalthoum, Mohammed Abdel Wahab and Farid Al Atrash performed at cultural centres there that existed before the Palestinians lost their homeland in 1948, when dozens of national newspapers and magazines were still published.

 

Jaffa was praised for its fish and oranges, which were exported to Europe. Contrary to popular belief, the Zionists did not continue cultivating the fruit, but held on to the label for commercial benefit.

Sunset over Jaffa

 

Nowadays, Jaffa is home to Andromeda’s rock, the house of Simon the Tanner, St. Peter’s monastery and Al Mahmoudiya mosque, which looks out to a former small settlement, now an urban jungle named Tel Aviv.

 

Even before visiting Jaffa, the confrontation with half a century of physical decline and emotional corrosion was like being abruptly shaken out of a dream. Upon embarking my flight, my ticket stub read ‘Tel-Aviv-Jaffo’, indicating that the pre-1948 city has been reduced to a Tel Aviv suburb.

 

It still has spirit, which was revealed on the winding Karm-et-Toutte (now Yefet) street, still holding magnificent Arab buildings. Now abandoned and boarded up, they are the only homes with an aesthetic touch. Unlike Israeli construction, they were not assembled in a hurry to accommodate thousands of Jewish immigrants.

 

This continues into the Al Ajami, the only neighbourhood where Palestinian families outnumber the Israeli community that is expanding into Jaffa. Ironically, there is not a single sign written in Arabic.

 

Heading towards Tel Aviv, the old Al Manshiya neighborhood holds the famous Hassan Bek mosque which, like several Islamic shrines, is under constant threat of being seized by the municipality. In the former Nuzha neighborhood, one mosque has been turned into a plastics factory, while a nightclub called Aladdin in the old city is covered by a familiar-looking dome.

 

As I walk through Jaffa, I wonder who lived in these abandoned buildings and how petrified they must have felt when they were expelled. Almost 60 years on, they are still unable to use the house keys they fled with.

 

Nowadays, there is little mention of Jaffa’s once-dynamic, compelling character. Palestinian heritage is denied by a regime that has attempted to conceal its existence since the earliest Zionist propaganda.

 

Even in the old city (the only area that the municipality has bothered to sustain), the historical contributions cited on tourist signs exclusively refer to former “non-Arab” occupiers – and the Zionists. If one did not know better, one would believe Israelis built Jaffa.

 

The old city has been transformed into an artists’ colony, where monumental buildings have been renovated into cafés and luxury apartments that Palestinians are unable to inhabit.

 

The most discouraging factor that prevents displaced refugees from returning to their abandoned homes is the Absentee Property Law. This is a deliberate policy forbidding refugees from re-entering their homes under the guise that the neglected buildings are too dangerous to reside in. Instead, they are renovated and sold at mortgage rates that only Israelis can afford.

 

Those who have attempted to buy are either turned down with alternative forms of discrimination, or are considered traitors by the Palestinian community for compromising their pride to abide by racist policies.

 

Another factor that has undergone significant damage in Jaffa is identity. A woman I interviewed explains that although she is recognised as Arab, she does not label herself as Palestinian outside her home.

 

“If we expose our native background in public,” says Abeer, “we risk being monitored by the Shabak (Israeli security service), which equates to being randomly suspected of illegal political activity. We’re collectively conditioned to forget who we are, and the younger generation is a clear indicator of this.”

 

Collective social adjustment is indeed apparent when she speaks: not one sentence is completed without inserting several words of Hebrew, although I keep insisting I only understand Arabic. “This is just one consequence of mass assimilation,” she says.

 

Nowadays, Jaffa has one of the highest levels of crime and poverty rates in Israel. “Drug abuse is highly tolerated by Israeli authorities because it distracts the youth from political activism,” says Abeer.

 

“During our parents’ time, the Palestinian flag was illegal. They never encouraged us to be patriotic. We live in one of the most difficult areas because we’re located right near Tel Aviv and are overwhelmed by the city’s demands. We’re often afraid that we’ll lose a connection with our roots, even though we remain Arabs. But our heritage is more apparent in our faith in religion, not culture.”

 

This is once again confirmed when she asks what I am doing here and why I do not learn Hebrew, to which I answer: “I’m Palestinian. Do you ever ask an Israeli what they’re doing here or why they don’t learn Arabic?”

 

I do not mean to hurt her. Likewise, I realise that those who are integrated in Israeli society do not intend to insult me when they laugh at my Palestinian patriotism. I could claim they do not know better, but once we start patronising each another we give in to the strategy Israel has been working so hard on: to separate us from each other through religious diversity, borders, the apartheid wall, and in this case, cultural barriers. We have already lost so much and become so estranged from one another.

 

Fairuz sings about the nostalgia that takes her back to Jaffa, but she is returning to a ghost town. Is this ghost left behind by the ones who escaped, or is it the painful vacancy that has created a void in Jaffa? If the Bride of the Sea only knew, she may be able to reconcile our haunting memories.