Talk:Haifa

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[edit] Transliterations, translations and spellings of the word Haifa

Regarding various transliterations, translations and spellings of the word Haifa: we must keep the number of those small, to avoid cluttering up the first line. I agree that Haifa as a multi-lingual city, having a Hebrew-speaking majority and Arab-speaking minority, should mention the name of the city in both Hebrew and Arabic. However, I don't see why we need several alternative English names - "Haifa" is the only way this city's is ever written, by foreigners and by Israelis. I never saw the spelling "Hefa" anywhere (actually used), so I would leave that out. Also, if you want to explain how to pronounce the Hebrew and Arabic name (because you're right, both of them are not pronounced like English-speakers say "Haifa"), at least don't make mistakes. For the Hebrew, you write something like "Hefah", and insist on the last h. Why??? The letter 'he' in the end of the word is silent. It does not get pronounced like an h. This is why I removed it, and I don't understand why you put it back. Also, the pronounciation guides should not be bold, because these are not official names or spellings, just pronounciation guides. Just my 2 cents.... Nyh 06:53, 12 May 2004 (UTC)

Moreover, the "f" sound in the name is exactly the same letter in both Arabic and Hebrew, and pronounced exactly the same. So why use "ph" in Hebrew and "f" in Arabic pronounciations? Nyh 06:56, 12 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Lay vs. Scientific transliterations

Well, the civil Modern Hebrew transliterations are for lay-people, ordinary citizens who want quick information. The secondary information I've been putting all over the place is a scientific transliteration of Hebrew used by linguists to represent all the dialect-neutral phonemes. It's just for completeness. I don't dispute the removal of "Hefa", but "Hêphāh" is very good for all us dry academic researchers out there. :) Besides, other Israeli city articles have even more alternate names than this article, and they are all relevant to the history and linguistics. See Akko and Ashqelon for examples. As Haifa has a shorter history and only two languages, it only needs the three transliterations: civil/lay, scientific Hebrew, and scientific Arabic. - Gilgamesh 07:16, 12 May 2004 (UTC):I agree - for language freaks like me :), the linguist's transliteration is very useful. It certainly doesn't reflect the modern pronunciation, but it's a pretty good guide to how Hebrew was pronounced about 2000 years ago, and it is a widely known academic standard. I wouldn't want it to be the only pronunciation info, but personally I think it has its place. - Mustafaa 07:37, 12 May 2004 (UTC)
Actually, I'd say that's more like 1200 years ago, Mustafaa. But I agree anyway. - Gilgamesh 19:39, 12 May 2004 (UTC)
Since Haifa did not really exist (or existed in a form irrelevant to today) 2000 or 1200 years ago, all this is irrelevent. But even if it were, I think you guys are wrong regarding pronunciation: The final he (much like Arabic "ta marbuta") in words ending in "a" sounds (usually signifying a female gender) was never pronounced like a consonant "h". Hebrew has a special mark, a "mapik", which says that the he is pronounced (in Arabic ta-marbuta and he are seperate letters). In fact, I believe (from what I read once) that when Hebrew originated (say, 2500-3000 years ago) from some proto-semitic language, it had no vowel marks whatsoever. Kelev and Kalba (male and female dog) were spelled exactly the same, with three consonant letters, but pronounced differently. Sometime later people began adding imot kria - letters he, yod, vav, aleph - to ease reading in some cases, and the final he was one of those letters added, and as far as I know was never actually pronounced as an "h". Regarding the "f" vs. "ph" - I believe that the Hebrew and Arabic letters sound the same, and originating from the same proto-semitic sound, so I don't understand why spell them differently just because in Hebrew the "p" and "ph" sound are spelled with the same basic letter form while arabic has no "p" sound at all.

[edit] The shrine of the Bab on the side of Mt Carmel

The shrine of the Bab on the side of Mt Carmel in the center of the terraced Baha'i Gardens is not a temple. It is a funeral monument housing the shrine and body of the Bab, the first prophet, the precursor of the Baha'i Faith, and of Abdu'l-Baha the son of the second prophet of the Baha'i faith, Baha'u'llah.

It's a nitpick, but it's a critical nitpick to Baha'is, hearing it called a temple drives Baha'is slightly nuts. Thanks for listening. - rboatright

I always thought the Bab was buried in Acre and that this was a central shrine. Danny 05:01 Feb 11, 2003 (UTC)

No, Baha'u'llah is buried at the Shrine of Baha'u'llah at Baji outside of Acca (Acre.) the Shrine on the side of Mt Carmel is the Shrine of the Bab. The Bab's body is interred in a room the "right hand" side as you face the mountain, and Abdu'l-Baha is interred in a room on the "left hand" side as you face the mountain.

The white domed building is a superstructure built over the quite plain fieldstone building that actually houses the two rooms that are the shrines themselves.

The Shrine of Baha'u'llah at Bahji is the turning point of Baha'i prayers and is the direction that Baha'is face when praying. The Shrine of the Bab is more well known and promenent because it's half way up Mt Carmel and visible for kilometers.

[edit] Some changes I made

I made quite a few changes to the layout of the page, essentially cutting the the data into topical sections to make things look a bit cleaner.
I removed some previous comment saying that "Haifa's cultural and social life focus mainly around football (soccer)" - This is not really NPOV, in my opinion. I consider removing the whole sentence about Maccabi Haifa and its championships, since there is already an entry on Maccabi Haifa.
I also expanded a bit on Industries.

Some stuff that's currently missing:

  • Much more on the City's history
  • Museums
  • Festivals
    • Haifa film festival
    • Chag Kol Hachagim (how do you say that in english?)
  • The port
  • More on the city's neighborhoods
  • Environmental issues
  • Sacred places

Mikiher 21:26, 24 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Chag Kol Hachagim can be translated as the "Holiday of all holidays" and it is an event the celebrate the Jewish Chanukah, the Christian Christmas and the Muslim Ramadan and promote co-existence, since they are all occure together around December. MathKnight 21:34, 2 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The narrative in this article is primarily an Israeli one, and seems to neglect the point of view of the many current and former Palestinian residents of Haifa. Credible historians - including some Israeli scholars - offer a very different narrative than the one provided here. Significant information has been omitted from this article, such as a treatment of Palestinian history and heritage related to Haifa over many centuries, the explusion/exodus of Palestinians in 1947-48, and the current predicament of Palestinian Arabs within Israeli society today. Israeli historians and scholars such as Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim, Elan Pappe, Baruch Kimmerling, Tom Segev and others have documented the factual basis and historical legitimacy of the events neglected here - citing previously sealed Israeli state archives among other sources - and have also chronicled some of the human experiences that tell the missing story. And Palestinians scholars such as Edward Said, Rashid Khalidi and others have offered similar narratives supported by documentary evidence, all of which is missing in the heavily Israeli POV offered here. A concise web source that offers a different POV can be found at http://www.palestineremembered.com/Haifa/Haifa/ - this is not an in-depth treatment but rather a summary, and I have not attempted to incorporate significant elements from this web page into the Wikipedia article on Haifa. Rather, I've made a few minor changes and removed a couple of obvious NPOV violations, in an effort to move in the direction of neutral POV, but this article remains significantly short of that goal. To reflect this, I added the POV warning until this article can be further rehabilitated. - GeorgeA

Chag Kol Hachagim is usually translated in Haifa municipal literature as "Festival of Festivals" which sounds better in English than the more literal translation noted above. I disagree with GeorgeA: the spirit of coexistence is certainly stronger here than the adversarial narratives proposed by Benny Morris (who has retracted many of his previous opinions) and Elan Pappe (whose graduate student Teddy Katz admitted in court to falsifying interviews from Arab witnesses). Whereas sectarian tension may be found in parts of Israel, there is not much evidence of it in Haifa. - John Kennedy, Kababir, Haifa, Israel may 2005

[edit] Recent Events

Am I justified in suspecting the contents of the "Recent Events" section is politicially motivated? --Admbws 01:29, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I was indeed playing with the thought of removing this section. In addition to possibly being pollitically motivated, it also looks a bit out of place in an encyclopedia article about a city (although the event itself was indeed painful and traumatizing to Haifa's inhabitants, along with the other 3 major terrorist attacks that happened in the city during the last few years). I think we can remove the Recent Events section or at least put it in the talk page for a while. -- Mikiher 01:51, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC)
OK, I've just removed this section. I've pasted it below for a while for the sake of objections. -- Mikiher 01:58, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC)
The city of Haifa known more lethal massacre during the last 4 years, including the Matza restaurant massacre and serveral lethal bus suicide bombings. Among the victims were Christians and Arabs as well. MathKnight 21:34, 2 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Suicide attack

On Saturday, October 4, 2003 the palestinian terrorist woman Hanadi Jaradat executed a suicide attack in the popular restaurant Maxim's in Haifa, killing 21 people and wounding 51 others.

[edit] Changes of Hebrew definitions

See discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism#New "twist and turn" as "Hebrew alphabet" is switched to "Hebrew languages" concerning appropriate uses of the word "Hebrew" here. IZAK 05:33, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Various religions

Noted by Jews for the Cave of Elijah, Haifa is also cherished by the Christian and Bahá'í faiths.

What about Muslims and Druze? Don't they also recognize Elijah as a prophet? Michael Hardy 03:28, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV

Nothing written here is fair or balanced. Haifa was always an arab city and now it is in Israel, we the Jews took it. End of story. Joseph FRIEDMANN

This doesn't really seem to be a reason to call the article NPOV. Convention is to use the current political boundaries, and refrain from political discourse one way or the other. I'm going to remove the NPOV tag from the article - if you have any other reasons why this should be discussed further, please return the tag to the article and post your concerns here. Also be sure to sign your comments with ~~~~. ESkog 04:32, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree. If you think that a specific fact in this article is biased, please fix it or discuss it here. The fact that "Haifa" is an existing city, in an existing country "Israel" cannot be disputed. Wikipedia is about reporting the existing facts, not about wishful thinking on how you'd like the facts to be. I'm removing the POV tag. If you want, you can eleborate in the article about Haifa's history, about the size of its Arab population before 1948, and about how certain people (who?) still consider it part of an occupied Palestine which is yet to be liberated. Nyh 08:28, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

Does anyone know where I can find actual results for the 1993 and 1998 mayor elections? Or at least know what day they were on, I only know they were in November. Pimpalicious 09:19, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

If you have a Hebrew calendar for these years you can find the dates. According to Israeli law, election day is the 3rd Tuesday of Heshvan (the 2nd month of the Hebrew calendar) in case the previous year was a regular one, or the 1st Tuesday of Heshvan if the previous year was a leap one (with an extra month).--Nitsansh 01:14, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
According to my calculation, election day was November 2nd in 1993 and November 10th in 1998.

[edit] Regarding the city's name

I am temporarily removing the the following sentence:

... The name Haifa is derived from the Levantine Arabic word الحيفة al-Ḥayfah meaning 'nearby,' ...

I have found no evidence that this is actually correct. In addition it does not make any sense - how can the name be derived from Arabic when the town is mentioned in the Talmud, much before Arabs even started arriving at the area. Can the person who put this provide the reference from which this was taken? Mikiher 12:20, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I just found that the above sentence (and the ones before it and after it) was takend from the Palestine Remembered web site. While they may be correct, please add another source to corroborate the facts - I have not been able to do so. Mikiher 13:26, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Image size

I bumped the image back up to 300 pixels, which is about the width of an infobox. Most pages seem to have that (non-representative sample: Budapest, Istanbul) or bigger (Mecca — 400px!); New York City has slightly smaller, but has an infobox next to the TOC. I'm not sure what to do if this page still displays funny, because in that case all of Wikipedia will display funny for you. --Mgreenbe 13:52, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Funicular subway

This paragraph:

Other intracity transport options include a funicular subway and a cablecar. The Carmelit subway runs from Kikar Paris downtown to Gan HaEm (Mother's Park) at the top of Mount Carmel. With a single track, six stations and two trains, it is among the smallest subway systems in the world. The cablecar connects Bat Galim on the coast to the Stella Maris monastery atop Carmel; it is chiefly a tourist attraction.

is confusing. It sounds like the thing being described is not a subway (rapid transit), but a funicular. Is this correct? I'm loathe to change the article when I know nothing about it, but it needs clarification as it stands... — SteveRwanda 17:59, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

It is subterranean... --AceMyth 18:19, 16 March 2006 (UTC)


OK, then I'll just change the subway wikilink to point to rapid transit since that's where the main page for this kind of transport now resides. I doubt this is particularly rapid, however, so you may want to alter it again, but metro, subway, underground and all such things are now represented on the one rapid transit page, hence the old subway link has to point there now. Or something. — SteveRwanda 18:33, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Do trams have a history in Haifa, or anywhere else in Israel?Myrtone (the strict Australian wikipedian)

Well, AFAIK, there're no tram lines in modern Israel, and it seems that they never were in the past. --unpluggged 15:55, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Oil refinery massacre

One of the main reasons this city is remembered for is the oil refinery massacre that took place against both sides and the aftermath that followed. I don't believe it has been covered in sufficient detail and deserves its own sub-heading.

I believe the key points need to be included

  • Etzel was responsible for throwing the first bomb
  • Some arabs workers had tried to protect some of the Jewish workers in the retaliation attack
  • There were further reprisal attacks from Hagana's strike force palmah, in the villages Balad al-Shaykh and Hawasa not far from Haifa where some sixty men, women, and children were murdered and destroyed several dozen houses.

These facts are not in dispute as far as i know Thanks Zcaky06 01:01, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

It appears that the massacre deserves more than a sub-heading; it already has its own article at Haifa Oil Refinery massacre. I had trouble finding sources for the Irgun connection, though one of the sources on the article claims that they took credit (I recommend the Palestine Post front page article and continuation). The Balad al-Shaykh massacre also has its own article, though the numbers seem to be a matter of dispute. TewfikTalk 04:32, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Thats true, but the articles are extremely short an i see no reason to include the same details in this article since, as i have already stated, it is one of the main reasons this city is remembered. The edit i put was only a short paragraph and it is not as though this article is particularly large. Also the account reported in this article as it stands is very biased, it reports that arabs massacared the Jews, but it leaves the people who threw the bomb as undefined and it does not show the complex and bloody aftermath that followed. Basically, the only defined aggressors in this whole section are the Arabs and that is simply unfair and i feel that it is essential that my edit is maintained. If you feel that my wording is unfair then please feel free to edit, but please do not delete any facts that have been backed up with the source i have provided. Thank you Zcaky06 10:50, 6 June 2006 (UTC) By the way when i reverted the edit i left a comment which was supposed to say the Etzel claim is sourced, please check the link at the end

Hi Zcaky, I'm looking to Hebron and its method of dealing with the Riots in Palestine of 1929, i.e., including just the basic details relevant to the city's history, while keeping all the details of the conflict on their respective pages. I believe that this is accomplished on Haifa by mentioning the attack on the Arab labourers, and the subsequent killing of the Jewish employees. While the Palmach attack is relevant to the chain of events in terms of the '48 actions, I'm not sure if it's relevant to Haifa, though we can debate that. However, this discussion should certainly be expanded on the relevant pages. The source you provided may be sufficient for proving certain claims, but I'm not sure if it's a reliable source for all details of this matter, like the Irgun issue. Moreover, it doesn't provide any source for the Irgun statement, though I acknowledge that another (POV) site claims that the Irgun took responsibility, though again, without a source. Now even if we don't find a source for who carried out the attack, the reader can judge for themself that it may have been a Jewish group, though we cannot embark on original research. I'll continue below... TewfikTalk 00:04, 7 June 2006 (UTC)


http://www.mideastweb.org/refriots.htm

http://www.habonimdror.org/resources/arab%20israeli%20conflict/history.htm Above are other sources which also says that it was Etzel or Irgun that carried out the attack, there does not seem to be any confusion over who carried out the attack. Shere consensus of articles that aren't biased ( at least not against the Jewish people) should prove reliability so unless you can find an article that shows there maybe confusion over the perpetrators of the bombings i can't understand why you keep reverting it considering this is a very important point and prevents the article becoming plainly biased, further the Jewish Agency issued an apology for the attack. The Palmach attack is also relevent as it was intended to target the workers of the Haifa Oil refinery and also for giving a well rounded picture of the event. There is no point in being rigid in making sure what is said in one article is not repeated in another article at the risk of the individual articles failing to reveal the whole picture. Zcaky06 02:27, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi Zcaky,
The Irgun/Etzel sources are carbon copies, and both are present on sites with agendas that preclude them from being WP:Reliable sources for this proof (neither quotes an exterior source either). I didn't include a reference to the Balad al-Shaykh massacre because I believe that the two events were included as background for why the Zionists felt they needed to occupy the city. The 1948 war article and/or massacre sequences would be more appropriate venues for expanding on the subject, though if you disagree, feel free to make a case. Cheers, TewfikTalk 06:36, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
It's misleading to explain "why the Zionists felt they needed to occupy the city." For 65 years they'd been intending to seize as much of Palestine as they could manage (and Lebanon, and probably as far as Iraq). Ample evidence for that, from the people with the guns and the leaders planning to carry it out. PalestineRemembered 22:52, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but i strongly contest that there is a anti-jewish/zionist agenda in two of the sources i have provided, as the first talks of the event looking at the spread of communism and the second was written by a Jewish person looking how well Arabs and Jewish people worked together which was then published by the University of California, neither show a strong anti-zionist or anti-arab agenda. The fact that it was published by a reputable institution makes the article reputable even though it does not quote an external source on the following basis .

Publications with teams of fact-checkers, reporters, editors, lawyers, and managers — like the New York Times or The Times of London — are likely to be reliable, and are regarded as reputable sources for the purposes of Wikipedia.

I also disagree with the view to chop up facts from eachother and distribute them in different articles. The Haifa oil refinery massacre is not only an extremely important topic to Haifa but also an extremely sensitive one, it cannot be dealt with properly unless the whole picture is revealed. Thank you Zcaky06 12:20, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi Zcaky,
I apologise for not being sufficiently clear - I didn't object because the sources were pro-Arab or pro-Jewish, but I was concerned about the socialist nature of the articles, one of whom is openly Marxist, and only in reference to a specific identification of the right-wing/revisionist Etzel/Irgun, especially when no documentation is provided. I was unaware that the second article was published by UC, and so I kept the Irgun reference, though I would still like to see a clearer piece of evidence. I should also note that NPOV generally doesn't allow for calling groups "terrorist" unless they identify themselves as such. In terms of a separate heading, it doesn't make sense to have a table of contents reading "History, Haifa Oil Refinery Massacre, Religion, etc." If you look at History of Jerusalem#British Mandate (1917-1948) and Hebron#History, you'll note that the former only tangentially notes the major "massacres," while the latter, which is more analogous to Haifa, provides two lines on the subject of the 1929 events. In short, while it's important to mention that the massacre happened, this isn't the place for extensive documentation of the event. We can discuss the Balad al-Shaykh massacre's inclusion if you like. I believe that the refinery events are mentioned in the context of the Zionists' desire to control Haifa, though we can discuss this point. Cheers, TewfikTalk 07:11, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi, i will concede that it is not generally a NPOV to use terrorist, so i will not object to the exclusion of its use. However, after going through the links, my main problem is the way the Haifa massacre is now spread over three articles, the longest being 8 lines long. Also could you provide a reference that says the Arab Legion took part in the killings. Zcaky06 09:56, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi Zcaky,
You're correct about the spread - unfortunately very little was written about the events. We can rectify that by expanding Haifa Oil Refinery massacre and Balad al-Shaykh massacre, so that anyone interested can follow the link and read the whole story. I have to say again that this has been a good collaboration, and I look forward to continuing work with you. As for the Legion, its best if we keep the discussion on the massacre page. For the sake of convenience: I was mistaken. I misread the original Palestine Post article (linked to on the Refinery massacre page), which accuses the Arab TAC (police) of taking part in the killing, and only mentions that the Legion may have harboured the rioters afterwards. Cheers, TewfikTalk 01:32, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Peaceful coexistence???

I am aware that this city used to be considered an area where Muslims and Jews used to get along, but i am doubtful of the current situation, can someone please provide a source. Zcaky06 01:04, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, it is still considered a city of coexistence, as in this Arab Councilor's quote. Cheers, TewfikTalk 04:32, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks thats fine but i feel that the article should state as indicated in the source you provided that the peaceful co-existence is under threat of collapsing. Zcaky06 10:55, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

The quote doesn't establish that "peaceful co-existence is under threat of collapsing," only that the concept of peaceful coexistence is commonly held with regard to Haifa. Cheers, TewfikTalk 00:04, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lebanese Rocket Attacks

On July 12, 2006, several rocketes were fired at Haifa, killing 2 civilan and injuring several more, I think that info should be added to the artice FinalWish

I strongly agree, and was going to say the same thing here too as the person above. =Joel==

It seems that if this information is added, it should be put in history. It appears that someone added it to the summary at the top. Any opinions?

Re Lebanese Rocket Attacks:
I strongly believe the rocket attacks should be left out of the article, as it detracts from the main focuse of what the article should be about - the city itself - and is only leading to what appears to be continuous vandalism of the page by both sides trying trying to present their point of views. Perhaps when the current conflict has resolved itself a small note can be added, but I think at the time being it should be removed.

[edit] Status of Hezbollah

The article describes the perpetrators of the rocket attacks as "defence of Lebanon organisation Hezbollah in retalation of the 310 lives lost, and infrastructure destroyed by Israel's bombing of their country." Being that the international community has designated Hezbollah as a terrist organization it is apparent that this article's description of it as a "defence" group is highly questionable. Furthermore, considering that wikipedia seeks to be apolitical, the second part of the setence is highly innapropriate, especially considering that the article focuses on Haifa, not on the reason of the fighting. I have tried to fix it and it was put up once again. I will try once more and seek the support of the wikipedia community in maintaining the quality and bias standards which wikipedia strives to keep. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mr.lightbulb (talk • contribs) 20:06, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


I Agree with the above posting. However here is the status of Hizbullah amongst Non Americans:
Hezbollah is not a terrorist organization. Only some countries like the United States say so, NOT THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY many countries call Israel a fascist state. These countries include non Muslim countries as well. So should we refer Israel as a fascist state too in wikipedia.
Do you hear what goes on from Fox news; The Jewish owned press in many countries refer to Hezbollah as a terrorist organization?
Much of the Western News media is Jewish owned. In other non Jewish owned media Jews are predominant in the higher echelons of management. It is here we hear Hezbollah referred as a terrorist organization.

The Bush Blair agenda also refer to Hezbollah as terrorism, but wikipedia does not follow the agenda of political leaders even if they are from high and mighty countries.

The BBC used to refer to Hezbollah as a terrorist organization until the readers challenged the BBC to prove it. Now the BBC mealy refers to Hezbollah as a militant organization.
The US Government actually calls Palestinians fighting the military boot of Israel as terrorists. It calls the resistance in Iraq terrorist. I call Iran terrorist. Russia was called the evil empire by Ronald Reagan. However the CIA with their rendition flights and torture programs is just called a Agency
If we follow the Americans and call Hizbullah terrorist then The Israel Air force pilots are Surgeons:
What do we call the people who drop the huge daisy cutter bombs from F16s on children the Jewish press should call them surgeons as they make surgical strikes, and give employment to hundreds of Arab surgeons?
ALSO SOLDIERS ARE NEVER KIDNAPPED. IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE SOLDIERS ARE ALWAYS CAPTURED YOU CAN KIDNAP A CIVILIAN BUT NEVER A SOLDIER
ISRAEL HAS OVER A THOUSAND KIDNAPPED CIVILANS FROM LEBONON IN ITS JAILS AND HAS CAPTURED MANY HIZBULLAH SOLDIERS
Israel has over fourteen thousand Palestinians in detention for many years. Most of these can be said to be kidnapped as they are kept without trial
The hear the truth tune into democracy Now Broadcast on the Internet —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.1.122.239 (talk • contribs) 22:42, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
Not Terrorist?:
Please tell me how hezbolla aren't terrorists. Keep in mind, the American revolutionaries would also be considered terrorists today, though I feel that Hezbollah's actions have been deplorable. Their rocket attacks have been on civilian targets 100%. How does the imprisonment of lebanese justify targeting civilians?
The below quote seems biased to me. I would like for whoever put that in there to educate the rest of us and describe just how terrible a place Haifa was before the Jews came and worked their butts off to make it so beautiful. Please include pictures. Even if it's correct, the way that paragraph has been presented serves no purpose but to put down Arabs while putting Jewish people on some sort of a pedistal.
The city was predominately Arab pre-1947; however, over 85,000 Arabs fled to Lebanon. The beautiful infrastructure and vibrant economy of the city is due to the hard work of Jews who have setteled here. Their pioneering efforts have made the city one of the most beautiful in Israel. These immigrants who escaped from Germany and who were later joined by others from the USA have preserved most of the old city by converting old dwellings into luxury apartments while preserving the historic facades of the buildings.
I already deleted an entire paragraph that was poorly written regarding the current mess that's going on over there. I don't think it belonged in the "history" section, anyways. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jcm267 (talk • contribs) 23:23, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
My changes were reverted with a suggestion to see the whole talk page first, but it looks like there's not much disagreement with them actually written here. There's Talk:Haifa#contempt, but that provides no reason to keep a similar paragraph in the face of its citing no sources at all. Nysin 11:23, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pointless reverting?

User:81.170.0.101 keeps reverting even edits initially of mine that, as far as I can tell, are completely innocuous by any reasonable standard, such as this and the change from "seaport" linking to Port of Haifa specifically. Is this just knee-jerk editing, or is there a reason for this? Nysin 16:30, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I'm following what you're saying here with these examples you're giving, but I just went through and tried to bring some order to this talk page and I found that there was a lot of deleting going on by a couple of people.
This is the first time I've seen people delete other people's statements on talk pages. The rational given is sufficient to remove such statements from the article, but not on a talk page. If you disagree with them then disagree without censoring them. If you don't want to argue then don't argue, but don't delete someone else's comment. This is the forum for the article. If there is censorship here then it will be nearly impossible to identify and reduce POV in the article.
Also, if you're responding to someone else's post, sign your name by writing ~~~~, and please post under them in the same heading. There's no need to start a new heading unless you're starting a new conversation or the current one is getting really long. -LambaJan 01:53, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Re Lebanese Rocket Attacks

I strongly believe the rocket attacks should be left out of the article, as it detracts from the main focuse of what the article should be about - the city itself - and is only leading to what appears to be continuous vandalism of the page by both sides trying trying to present their point of views. Perhaps when the current conflict has resolved itself a small note can be added, but I think at the time being it should be removed.


[edit] We Jews unlike the Nazis do not distort or rewrite history, we also must not get emotional about the facts

Haifa had a small Jewish population and pre 1947 it was an Arab city mostly populated by Muslims. While not going into the rights or wrongs, of why the Arabs of Haifa fled to the Lebanon. The fact remains that Haifa is now a Jewish city. We will not try and pretend the Arabs did not exist and deny their existence. We have our own Holocaust deniers so what happened did happen and nothing can reverse it and we do not deny we forced them out. Haifa is now a beautiful city of Jews from Germany and America. Israel is an immigrant country and nearly all the population are first generation or second generation immigrants. We know we did not move into an empty land, nobody can deny this, the refugee camps of the Palestinians with 2.5 million refugees bear testimony to the fact that the land was not empty when we moved in. But all this is in the past. Three are many wrongs in History look at the plight of the Red Indians, Black slaves transported from Africa, Our of course our own Holocaust. Fifty years ago IS in the past, history, FULL STOP, we must not history interfere with the article on Haifa. What we must concentrate on as it is Haifa today in this article. We must write about work and achievement by these Jewish German and American pioneers who made the economy of Haifa boom. Sure there is Racism against the Arabs but then who can blame us, we are at war with them, the Muslims fire rockets at us. We are not angels but human beings - do not expect us to either love the Arabs or wish them well as long as they are at war with us we are entitle to treat them less than dogs. However we will not deny Haifa was pre 1947 and Arab town with very few Jews like the rest of Israel

First: would you please sign (~~~~) your comments?
This person is doesn't know what he's talking about. The city's population in 1948 was a very easy to remember 100,000. Most of it was recent, as the port was built in the 1920's to replace the port of Acre. In 1948, the Jewish population was 60,000, the Arab population was 40,000, mostly of Lebanese origin. The Mayor was Jewish. The Battle of Haifa was a militarily stupid attack by the Arabs. It failed, utterly. What happened next is the single most disgraceful thing the Arabs did in the war -- they bugged out. The British retained control over the port and permitted ferries to carry the Arabs to Lebanon. Why they left has been a matter of speculation ever since, but no serious historian claims that they were forced out. I recently interviewed the son of a Haifa "refugee" and asked him why his father left. The man sighed and said that his father was never able to answer that question. If anyone buys the current Arab line that the Arabs of Haifa were expelled, I suggest a trip to a university library to read the daily news reports. They are very clear. Also, ask yourself why neighboring Acre is still entirely Arab -- the answer is simple. Acre lacked a port for Lebanese ferries. The Arabs couldn't leave. Scott Adler 23:01, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
First, if you are going to insert comments into old discussion, please give it extra indentation so the sequence is not confused. Second, your population figures are a bit off, as indicated below. Third, your "mostly Lebanese" claim is complete fantasy. Fourth, bringing respectible sources will get you further than just sounding off. --Zerotalk 11:34, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
In any case, did you see this, this, this, this, this, and this? I note in each edit comment why I was whittling down each part of that paragraph you added back (and that another user just changed somewhat by shuffling sentences around). It's not about emotion, or distorting or rewriting history. Indeed, many of the historical statements in that paragraph this article already contains elsewhere, so removing that paragraph doesn't actually remove those statements. Nysin 13:08, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
This page, as any in Wikipedia, requires objectivity and focus and would benefit by further editing and expansion. However, I'd advise against making unsupportable claims, as in the title of this comment, about "[we] Jews" not practicing distortion and revisionism in writing history. One needn't make comparisons to the Nazis, but take a sober and instructive look at past and present examples even in Israel alone (let alone Jews writing in the Diaspora). Education Minister Yuli Tamir's current efforts to restore the Green Line to maps in textbooks used in Israeli schools, for one! As for "letting history interfere [sic] with the article on Haifa" -- many Wikipedia pages on geographic locations include content on the history, and such information is highly appropriate in an encyclopaedia article.-- Deborahjay 22:45, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] changes

My changes were reverted with a suggestion to see the whole talk page first, but it looks like there's not much disagreement with them actually written here. There's Talk:Haifa#contempt, but that provides no reason to keep a similar paragraph in the face of its citing no sources at all. Nysin 11:23, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


[edit] An explanation fior reverting, we also must not get emotional about the facts

Haifa had a small Jewish population and pre 1947 it was an Arab city mostly populated by Muslims. While not going into the rights or wrongs, of why the Arabs of Haifa fled to the Lebanon. The fact remains that Haifa is now a Jewish city. We will not try and pretend the Arabs did not exist and deny their existence. We have our own Holocaust deniers so what happened did happen and nothing can reverse it and we do not deny we forced them out. Haifa is now a beautiful city of Jews from Germany and America. Israel is an immigrant country and nearly all the population are first generation or second generation immigrants. We know we did not move into an empty land, nobody can deny this, the refugee camps of the Palestinians with 2.5 million refugees bear testimony to the fact that the land was not empty when we moved in. But all this is in the past. Three are many wrongs in History look at the plight of the Red Indians, Black slaves transported from Africa, Our of course our own Holocaust. Fifty years ago IS in the past, history, FULL STOP, we must not history interfere with the article on Haifa. What we must concentrate on as it is Haifa today in this article. We must write about work and achievement by these Jewish German and American pioneers who made the economy of Haifa boom. Sure there is Racism against the Arabs but then who can blame us, we are at war with them, the Muslims fire rockets at us. We are not angels but human beings - do not expect us to either love the Arabs or wish them well as long as they are at war with us we are entitle to treat them less than dogs. However we will not deny Haifa was pre 1947 and Arab town with very few Jews like the rest of Israel.

Again, this person is doesn't know what he's talking about. See my previous comment.Scott Adler 23:04, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
That's not an explanation for reverting. Primarily, the paragraphs you (I guess - you're on a different IP than the other one doing those reverts) have done and are doing are simply redundant. Further, do you deny that this article frequently fails to cite its sources, in violation of WP:V? Nysin 14:06, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] This article is unsourced.

I just went through and noted some dozens of unsourced statement. Unless someone can justify they're being sourced, they're endemic enough the {{unsourced}} tag to stay. Nysin 18:05, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm tempted to start going through the article, looking for statements not essential to describing the basic demographic, political, geographic, economic, and religious situation, and removing them; given that virtually none of the statements are currently sourced, and seem to have little hope of becoming sourced, it seems that this article shouldn't overextend itself. Objections (besides by that 8[01].x.y.z editor)? For example, the recent vandalism around claiming Haifa is "tolerant" I would remove outright unless it could be sourced, but (ostensible) statistics about the religious demographics of the city I would not. Nysin 22:15, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
Right. Hopefully when I start doing this hitherto unnannounced users won't come out of the woodwork, indignant. The notion is to reduce the article to what it can't do without as a basic description of the city, whilst ensuring that all new additions are sourced. Nysin 03:03, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tolerence of residents of Haifa

Nasin I wish these paragraphs to stay (First three introductory). I have included all your edits and thank you for your contribution to this page

First: you've sort of incorporated my edits. You haven't reverted as such, and in particular have kept the unsourced annotations, both sentence-specific and article-wide. That's progress.
However, you merely added back the same introductory paragraphs you added back before that are now doubly redundant insofar not only are my edited versions of those paragraphs in the religion section, those portions I edited out are, as my edit comments noted for each removal I did, already present in various portions of the article. Specifically, you appeared to ignore, rather than incorporate, this, this, this, this, and this. I'm not (yet) going to revert your addition, because you finally appear not to be editing entirely antagonistically, but do you dispute that not only do those five linked diffs highlight your adding information already in the article, but that rather thaer than having "included all [my] edits]", you've essentially ignored them in re-adding precisely the same paragraphs I removed them from without taking specific issue with my reasons for editing down your paragraph?
Once you agree not to keep re-inserting those five diffs' worth of sentences (or equivalent) in the article, then I'm more amenable to placing it somewhere - I'm not really attached to the religion section.
Finally, to point out the obvious - they're just as unsourced as anything else in this article. Do you have sources for them? Nysin 02:48, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Separate but equal

It didn't work in the US. Does it actually function as "equal" in Israel (assuming that part of the article isn't totally concocted)? Nysin 03:15, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Political agenda

I read unbelievingly the article and parts of the discussion. Surely the history of modern Haifa is more then the grievances inflicted by the “brutal” Jews on “innocent” Arabs? At the beginning of the 20Th century Haifa was a small town of about 20,000 residents (2,000 Jews) not 100,000 as is specified. How it evolved to be the main port in British Palestine and the center of engineering studies (see Technion) does not concern a bit those who have a political agenda to push. The only information they seemed to think is important is that in 1938 (in the middle of the great Arab Uprising in which 500 Jews were murdered) Jewish terrorists killed Arabs and that in 1947 because of the Jewish atrocity Arabs killed 39 Jewish workers. Shame. Avihu 04:19, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Whilst one cannot unambiguously read political agendas into people's edits, certainly numerous edits not particularly fitting the notion of "brutal Jews and innocent Arabs" exist: [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]. I'm especially fond of (my father was one of the original settlers there is no bias). The current state of the article is somewhat different, but it's oscillated. Nysin 10:18, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Haifa's climate

Does anyone else thinks that the recent change in the climate section (from hot, humid summers to hot, dry summers) is ridicules and should be reverted? Db1944 14:41, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] People of note born in Haifa

Should there be a section on this? Even though Gene Simmons is the only person of note ever born in Haifa.--74.114.107.77 02:22, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

I created it (though you could've). The Haifa page in the Hebrew Wikipedia has nothing similar, so let's see if this heading will generate further content. Also, I'm not sure it's properly worded or placed in the sequence of sections on the page, so hope a more knowledgeable editor will adjust this if necessary. Deborahjay 22:59, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] This was cut

The following was cut without comment. I notice that it had a {{fact}} tag on it, so I am not restoring, but I think it is a useful bridge, if someone can cite for it. There is little in the article now to suggest how recently the city was overwhelmingly Arab. - Jmabel | Talk 02:34, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

At the beginning of the 20th Century, Haifa had emerged as an industrial port city and growing population center. At that time Haifa district was home to approximately 100,000 inhabitants, comprised of 82% Muslim Arab, 14% Christian Arabs, and 4% Jewish residents. [citation needed]

Note it says Haifa "district". After some awesomely brilliant detective work, I believe that these numbers are the Ottoman statistics for the Haifa Kaza in 1905-6, except that the total is 4 times too high. McCarthy (Population of Palestine, p52) reports: 19244 Muslims, 3302 Christians, 914 Jews; Total=23460. For the city of Haifa, the 1905-6 figures were 3635 Muslims, 3185 Christians, 125 Jews; Total=6945. In both cases, probably only Ottoman citizens were counted which would have missed many Jews (maybe most).

The city population during the British Mandate (Government of Palestine, Office of Statistics: Vital Statistics Tables 1922-1945) was
1922: 9377 Moslems, 6230 Jews, 8863 Christians, 164 Others; Total=24634.
1931: 20324 Moslems, 15923 Jews, 13824 Christians, 332 Others; Total=50403.
1944: 35940 Moslems, 66000 Jews, 26570 Christians, 290 Others; Total=128800.
The fact that Haifa's Arab population had far more Christians than the Palestine average is worth noting.-- I'm almost out of editting time for a week, so if anyone else would like to add this information to the article, feel free. --Zerotalk 11:26, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why are Christians cut out of the article?

This article in the paragraph Haifa Today states that there are only Bahai, Arab and Jewish people in Haifa. Why are Christians not mentioned? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Flembotembo (talk • contribs) 13:53, 5 January 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Too many images

I think this article has too many similar photos. There are for example two almost identical photos of the Bahaii gardens from below (and an additional one from above). Which images should we keep? -- Ynhockey (Talk) 10:55, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


[edit] A Personal intro. to Haifa?

What was this:

Doing in the external links? 1. just after what? 2000 IL-Leb invasion? what is this? 2. Who is the writer? 3. what does this mean? except the fact that the author has some fond memories \ ideas about Haifa? The only good thing I see about this is that it includes lots of pictures of Haifa. However, these are taken from very few locations. There are no pictures of most of the docks and bay, the student neighborhoods, The Carmel center and Moria, The technological industries park (MATAM), The Technion, Much more of the University + all pictures of "downtown"* Haifa are looking outside and not at the "downtown"* itself. (* "downtown" - is used in Haifa to refer to some of the lower areas - neighborhoods) 85.65.215.115 12:42, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Can't Read part!!!!!!!

PIc covers some info —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 216.54.105.2 (talk) 16:41, 8 February 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Picture Dilemma

Maybe the article needs to be on picture diet. There is a lot of pictures all over it. - Qasamaan 08:38, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

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