# 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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> l
> 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
> .....,......a..    x...maoá--z..,1...,..,-..a-áá""s"''..' - á - - - - - . -.....~~-~ ... _..... . . . . ___,. . . ._, ......~.- . ,....,. _
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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
> binding. The paperback edition is sold subject to the
> condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise,
> be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated with-
> out the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding
> or cover other than that in which it is published and
> 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)*