(ISRAEL, LAND OF)

In this extremely detailed 11-page recollection addressed to Mordecai ben Hillel Hakohen, dated 29 Tammuz, 1927, Akiva Aryeh Weiss punctiliously recounts how the modern City of Tel Aviv came to exist . Weiss, a native of Lodz, Poland, tells how he arrived in Jaffa (for the first time) precisely at the time of Herzl’s death in summer of 1904. After a six-week tour of the Land, especially the recent established agricultural colonies, Weiss returned to Lodz to settle his affairs. In summer of 1906, he returned to Jaffa, settling there permanently. At a meeting in the local library, Jaffa’s residents were astonished when Weiss confidently asserted what the Land of Israel needed was a modern Jewish city alongside Jaffa. “It was only because Meir Dizengoff had introduced me as a “newcomer” that the crowd were courteous enough to hear me out.” As the meeting developed, the following objections were raised: Ottoman Turkish law forbade selling land to Jews. Secondly, Jews were not issued building permits (the buildings in the colonies were registered as “barns”). Thirdly, the Jews of Eretz Israel were strapped for funds, living for the most part off the largess of the Jews of the Diaspora (the “Chalukah” system). And fourthly, how would Jews, notorious for dissension among themselves, ever unite behind this cause? Weiss advised how a Turkish “kushan” might be obtained and also advised taking a loan from the Anglo-Palestine Bank. At a second meeting, held in the privacy of Weiss’ home, he unfurled his vision of the first modern Hebrew city: “Wide boulevards, sewage, electric illumination, proper plumbing. The administration in Jewish hands. The Sabbath, a Sabbath worthy of its name.” At that meeting, it was decided to launch a membership campaign for the society that later was called “Achuzath Bayith.” Weiss goes on to reveal the details concerning the actual purchase of the land, which was priced from 55 to 95 centimes the cubit. - And so, cosmopolitan Tel Aviv came to be