Oh home sweet home. Yaffa feels all too familiar these days, crowds of angry people in Gaza park (where the second intifada riots started in Yaffa), policemen on horses, helicopters and police cars, violent clashes and the closing of the main streets in Yaffa. Except heres the twist, this time the demonstrators are religious Jews. The demonstration, which began in front of the ‘French Hospital’ on Yeffet Street, featured thousands of Haredic Jews chanting and throwing rocks in protest of the excavations taking place on Andromeda where there is a historical Jewish graveyard. What was assumed to be another daily small illegal gathering of Haredic jews there to harass the excavators, ended up being a huge riot and hundreds were bussed to the area to demonstrate. The violent clashes between the police officers and the demonstrators resulted in the arrest of 15 demonstrators and several minor injuries on both sides. Although I understand why they felt the need to protest the excavations, I am so puzzled on how this got to be so big so quickly and was not stopped or dispersed earlier.

**Images borrowed from YaffaToday , Haaretz and Ynet.

Can you imagine an illegal gathering of Arab citizens infront of a rich closed neighborhood (Andromenda) and several schools? It just wouldnt happen. It would be stopped and disperesed even if the demonstrators were only 10 students with posters. It is practically impossible to get a permit for any demonstration in that area of any size. Not to underplay the cause of the protesters, which is fairly legitimate, how in the world did they get away with this? I guess the answer is simple: as long as it’s in an Arab city, the school children are all Arab and the protesters are Jewish then its fine to a certain extent. Bottles and rocks were thrown on officers, fires were started on the door of a local Arab school and policemen were injured before they pulled out the ‘big guns’ and brought it horses to disperse or at least relocate the demonstrators. And to where? to Gaza park. Only a few minutes away from Andromeda but away from the gentrified part of Yaffa into the mostly Arab part of the street. I drove by again several hours later and the streets were still drowned in black hats. Its a bit strange to see because usually this would signify the rising tensions between the Palestinian citizens and extreme rightist Jews or ex-settlers but this time it wasn’t even about the Arab Jewish divide. In the end though, the result is the same: those most affected by the demonstrations and riots will be the local Arab businesses on Yeffet that will loose what little buisness they have as the streets close and Yaffa is deemed ‘dangerous’ again.