Yesterday, during a bright sunny day, I visited the beautiful Ajami-neighborhood. Towards the end of the 19th century the Ajami neighborhood , stretching south of ‘Old-Jaffa’ started to be built. In the beginning of the 20th century hundreds of families, mainly Christian-Arabs, settled in Ajami. After 1948, a large Arab population from different parts of the country moved into the fast growing neighborhood, together with new Jewish immigrants from the Balkans and North-Africa. In the 1950s the Municipality of then Tel Aviv-Jaffa came with a foolish-plan to transform Ajami to a modern neighborhood. Many beautiful old homes were destroyed and a large part of the population (Arab and Jewish!) were forced (!) to leave their homes. The neighborhood conditions drastically and quickly deteriorated, while no modern infrastructure was build. Beside, … Read entire article »