The Jewish neighbourhoods of Jaffa and the question of annexation to Tel Aviv at the end of the British Mandate

Abstract

ABSTRACTOne of the most complex issues facing British rule on the local municipal level towards the end of the Mandate period was the problem of Jaffa's Jewish neighbourhoods. This question, which emerged with the outbreak of the 1936 disturbances, engaged the government thereafter until the end of the Mandate. The demand by the residents of Jaffa's Jewish neighbourhoods for annexation to Tel Aviv – actually for municipal detachment from Jaffa – constituted the root of the problem. In this setting of the sharpening of relations between the authorities and the Jews and Arabs in 1945–1947, all three involved parties found themselves deeply immersed in it in the attempt to bring about its resolution. The annexation problem ceaselessly preoccupied the institutions of the Jewish Yishuv as a Zionist–Yishuv struggle of the highest order. This period gave rise to a series of unprecedented moves by the Jewish side, which were intended to influence the British government toward solving the problem. The article examines its development of the problem from the viewpoint of the three sides concerned in the years 1945–1947, with the focus on the policy line adopted by the Jewish side, its implications and its results.