Welcome to Joppa by Dr. Giorgio (Marco) Rubin

Shalom! Peace be with you! Welcome to Joppa, as we pronounced the name of this fair city when I was alive. With its fine harbor and fertile hinterlands, Joppa is one of the oldest port cities in the world. It belonged to the tribe of Dan in the olden days.

The Egyptians conquered it, to control the coast road and the harbor. Any city with a fine harbor is assured a good living, and we at Joppa had the coast road as well. Trade from Anatolia, Syria, Phoenicia and Egypt moved north and south along that road, and our merchants had their fair share of it.

Philistines lived here until the Assyrians came and deported them all. You have heard of the prophet Jonah, have you not? Jonah tried to escape his divine orders to go to Nineveh, the Assyrian capital on the Tigris River. He tried to run away from God by boarding a boat in our harbor. But, you remember, the giant fish swallowed him and he was forced to go to Nineveh anyway.

The Babylonians moved us Jews to Babylon, but the Persians let us come back. When the Temple in Jerusalem was rebuilt, the cedars of Lebanon were brought ashore in our harbor.

Alexander and his successors moved Greeks here, and Phoenicians from Sidon. The Maccabees exiled all non-Jews from Joppa, though they soon returned.

In time, the Romans conquered and ruled through client kings like Herod and Agrippa. Most of us got along well here in Joppa, Jew and Greek, Roman and Phoenician, living and working side by side. Some of us Jews took up Greek ways, learning their language and philosophy, exercising in their gymnasium. Still others went to work for the Romans, as tax collectors or food suppliers or interpreters.

But there were those, and I was among them, who deeply resented foreign rule. I did not join the Zealots, for I was never a violent man, but I knew many of them here in this city. I remained a loyal Pharisee, strict in the law, but bowing to Roman rule.

Every once in a while, we would hear of a Zealot raid. Even then, they attacked their fellow Jews as often as they did the Romans. They felt any Jew who worked for the Romans was a traitor and they devised horrible deaths for them and for their entire families.

Once in a while a Roman soldier would take advantage of a girl, or steal from a shop. Once in a while young Greeks would pull the beard of one of our elders, or knock over a Jewish butcher's booth in the agora. But mostly, we lived separate lives, and got along quite well.

The trouble that drove us from this, our home, began in Caesarea, when Greeks defiled the synagogue. The high priest, Eliezar ben Hanania, led the people in storming the Roman garrison at Jerusalem. Our king, Agrippa II, fled with his sister Berenice to Galilee, where they hid until they could surrender to the Romans.

Cestius Gallus was governor of Syria in those days and came to quell the revolt. The XII Legion had been badly mauled fighting the Parthians, so Cestius sent it back to Syria. On the way, Eleazar ambushed the legion and took its eagle. Cestius had other troops, though, and with them he took Joppa. Our fleet was no match for his navy, and perished almost to a man. Here in the town the streets ran with blood as all of us survivors were slaughtered. But Cestius did not move fast enough for Emperor Nero, who sent the great general Vespasian to deal with us Jews. He headquartered at Caesarea Maritima and had a fortress and guards here in Joppa, too. With his sixty thousand crack troops, Vespasian quickly crushed all resistance in the north. But many of the Zealot party and their leaders, John of Gischala and Simon Ben Jair, went to Jerusalem. The Zealots were strict observers of the Law, like the Pharisees, but refused to be ruled by any but God. The Zealots had among them men, the Sicarii, who killed Romans and also any Jew who would not fight to the death. They used the most horrible tortures on any they thought had collaborated, any who advocated a truce. Rabbi Yohannan ben Zakkai was targeted by the Zealots early on. But his students smuggled him from the city, hidden in a coffin. Vespasian permitted him to settle and build a school at Yavneh. There the Halakha, which would guide Jewish life in the following ages, was codified. There the Sanhedrin convened and became the most important Jewish political, judicial and religious institution for the next four hundred years. In two years, the Zealots had slaughtered all the leaders of the revolt in the south. They burned the city's food reserve to stiffen the will of the people, so that many starved to death. For four years, they made terror at home in Jerusalem, until Vespasian's son, Titus, took the city in the year 70 C.E. The beautiful Temple was destroyed. A hundred thousand captives were taken to Rome. We Jews were scattered across the known world. Later, Vespasian resettled our town, naming it Flavia Joppe, after his own family name.

Dr. Giorgio (Marco) Rubin, a neurosurgeon at Beilinson Hospital, owner, with his family, of the Dizengoff Suites Hotel, located on the famous Dizengoff Street, Tel Aviv, near restaurants, shopping, other Tel Aviv hotels and the beach. More information about Dizengoff Suites Hotel can be found online at http://www.dizengoffsuites.co.il.