Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930: A Memoir
The literary memoir of a founder of Tel Aviv, now available for the first time in an annotated English translation.
 
Born in Jaffa in 1870, Yosef Eliyahu Chelouche grew up within a notable Sephardi family in the local Jewish community. He went on to become a prominent entrepreneur; a founder of Tel Aviv; and a fierce critic of the Ashkenazi Zionist leadership, Arab nationalism, and British colonial sectarianism; before emerging, in the last decade of his life, as an anguished public figure struggling to repair Arab-Jewish relations.
 
His memoir paints an intimate portrait of life in Palestine at the turn of the twentieth century, told from the perspective of a Middle Eastern Jew deeply embedded in local society. By centering on the world and experiences of a native Jew who was an eyewitness to and participant in the unfolding conflict in Palestine, this book shows how the course of Zionist politics and Jewish-Arab relations in pre-state Palestine might have taken alternative pathways. A comprehensive introduction sets the scene in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Jaffa and thoughtful annotations contextualize Chelouche’s story within the modern history of Palestine and Israel. Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930 tells the fascinating story of a civic leader—and offers a complex view of the various cultural, social, and political forces that forged multilayered Jewish identities in the Middle East. The book includes a family tree and is illustrated with photographs of the family and scenes of Jaffa and early Tel Aviv.
1147069595
Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930: A Memoir
The literary memoir of a founder of Tel Aviv, now available for the first time in an annotated English translation.
 
Born in Jaffa in 1870, Yosef Eliyahu Chelouche grew up within a notable Sephardi family in the local Jewish community. He went on to become a prominent entrepreneur; a founder of Tel Aviv; and a fierce critic of the Ashkenazi Zionist leadership, Arab nationalism, and British colonial sectarianism; before emerging, in the last decade of his life, as an anguished public figure struggling to repair Arab-Jewish relations.
 
His memoir paints an intimate portrait of life in Palestine at the turn of the twentieth century, told from the perspective of a Middle Eastern Jew deeply embedded in local society. By centering on the world and experiences of a native Jew who was an eyewitness to and participant in the unfolding conflict in Palestine, this book shows how the course of Zionist politics and Jewish-Arab relations in pre-state Palestine might have taken alternative pathways. A comprehensive introduction sets the scene in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Jaffa and thoughtful annotations contextualize Chelouche’s story within the modern history of Palestine and Israel. Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930 tells the fascinating story of a civic leader—and offers a complex view of the various cultural, social, and political forces that forged multilayered Jewish identities in the Middle East. The book includes a family tree and is illustrated with photographs of the family and scenes of Jaffa and early Tel Aviv.
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Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930: A Memoir

Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930: A Memoir

Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930: A Memoir

Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930: A Memoir

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Overview

The literary memoir of a founder of Tel Aviv, now available for the first time in an annotated English translation.
 
Born in Jaffa in 1870, Yosef Eliyahu Chelouche grew up within a notable Sephardi family in the local Jewish community. He went on to become a prominent entrepreneur; a founder of Tel Aviv; and a fierce critic of the Ashkenazi Zionist leadership, Arab nationalism, and British colonial sectarianism; before emerging, in the last decade of his life, as an anguished public figure struggling to repair Arab-Jewish relations.
 
His memoir paints an intimate portrait of life in Palestine at the turn of the twentieth century, told from the perspective of a Middle Eastern Jew deeply embedded in local society. By centering on the world and experiences of a native Jew who was an eyewitness to and participant in the unfolding conflict in Palestine, this book shows how the course of Zionist politics and Jewish-Arab relations in pre-state Palestine might have taken alternative pathways. A comprehensive introduction sets the scene in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Jaffa and thoughtful annotations contextualize Chelouche’s story within the modern history of Palestine and Israel. Between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, 1870-1930 tells the fascinating story of a civic leader—and offers a complex view of the various cultural, social, and political forces that forged multilayered Jewish identities in the Middle East. The book includes a family tree and is illustrated with photographs of the family and scenes of Jaffa and early Tel Aviv.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781684582563
Publisher: Brandeis University Press
Publication date: 12/22/2025
Series: The Tauber Institute Series for the Study of European Jewry
Pages: 400
Product dimensions: 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Yosef Eliyahu Chelouche (1870-1934) was a prominent builder, entrepreneur, public figure, and a founder of Tel Aviv.


Michelle U. Campos is associate professor of history and Jewish studies at Pennsylvania State University. A historian of late Ottoman Palestine, she is the author of Ottoman Brothers: Muslims, Christians, and Jews in Early Twentieth-Century Palestine.


Or Aleksandrowicz is assistant professor in the Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. He is an architectural and urban historian and serves as the chief editor of Architectures book series at Babel Publishers. Aleksandrowicz is also a descendant of Yosef Eliyahu Chelouche.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Editors’ Acknowledgements
Notes on Transliteration
List of Figures
Editors’ Introduction
Parashat Hayay: The Translated Memoir
Forward
Part I
Chapter 1: Days of My Infancy, Childhood, and Youth
Chapter 2: The Kidnapping of Yosef
Chapter 3: My Earliest Life Experiences; The First Pioneers
Chapter 4: My School Days in Beirut
Chapter 5: My engagement, and my father-in-law Rabbi Avraham Moyal
Chapter 6: My wedding, and my entry into the world of commerce
Chapter 7: In the days of the Turkish regime
Chapter 8: Visits to our home by famous people
Chapter 9: Between building and destruction
Chapter 10: Founding of Tel Aviv and construction of the Gymnasium
Chapter 11: New Company and The Shield association
Chapter 12: The silicate initiative, my dream - and those for whom it came true
Part II
Chapter 13: Beginning of the World War
Chapter 14: The days of Ottomanization and the cruel expulsion of the foreign subjects
Chapter 15: The final days in power of Baha al-Din and the audience with Djemal Pasha
Chapter 16: Days of hunger in the land
Chapter 17: The Expulsion of Jaffa and Tel Aviv
Chapter 18: A terrifying night in deserted Jaffa and more…
Chapter 19: The entry of the English into Petah Tikva, and their departure
Chapter 20: And they journeyed and encamped in the village of Qalqilya
Chapter 21: From Qalqilya to Kafr Jammal
Chapter 22: Informers, the Turkish government and kindly Arabs
Chapter 23: Imprisoned in Tulkarm, and once again in Kafr Jammal
Chapter 24: The arrival of the redeemers and conquerors of our country
Chapter 25: Following the Balfour Declaration, days of light and shadow
Chapter 26: Bloody clashes in Jaffa, May 1921
Chapter 27: The neighborly relations that broke down
Chapter 28: My work on behalf of building and expanding Tel Aviv
Chapter 29: The bloody riots of August 1929, and their aftermath
Epilogue
Chelouche Family Tree
Bibliography
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