Word: nablus
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...Jordan poor. One Israeli told me that agriculture was largely unmechanized and therefore backward; that the roads were narrow and bad. He added that the Israelis had now started to improve and widen them. At the Government Tourist Bureau in Tel Aviv I asked how I could get to Nablus, the most prosperous city of the West Bank, some 50 miles from Tel Aviv. I was informed that there was no bus, unless I wanted to travel via Jerusalem. So I went...
...care and love which the Arabs display for their land is also reflected in their towns. Before the war the Israelis knew only the rather sleepy Arab tourist towns of Acco and Nazareth. By comparison Nablus strikes any visitor as thriving. On our descent into the city we pass two-and three-story villas with expensive cars parked in the driveways. These are obviously the home sof the wealthy. But most of the houses in the city and on the hills around are well kept. Both by European and Israeli standards Nablus is a bustling, hard working, largely middle class...
...front of the city hall of Nablus there is a large mob. It turns out that everybody wants to see the mayor. As I enter the mayor's office another stereotype vanishes. People in Israel had told me about hand-carved mahogany chairs and tables inlaid with mother-of-pearl. On the contrary, the office is simple, nearly austere. Mayor Hamdi Kan'an is seated in front of a desk with his coat on; the room is under-heated on this unusually cold winter day. In a corner there is one electric heater. Mr. Kan'an tells me that...
...Aviv I had been told the story of an Arab merchant in Nablus who had preferred to close shop rather than cooperate with the Israeli authorities and do business with Jews. He was afraid of revenge by the local population after the return of Arab control. He had a piece of land which he planned to cultivate as soon as his stock ran out. It turns out to be a very uncharacteristic case. There has been general cooperation on the part of the people. Most teachers and civil servants have remained at work. Many of the police have stayed...
...ease the friction of occupation, the Israelis wisely decided to let the Arabs govern themselves as much as possible, and to ensure Arab cooperation they have invented a technique that might be called coercive noninterference. When the prewar mayor of Nablus (pop. 44,000) announced that he would resign rather than front for the Jews, the occupation authorities simply informed him that no one would be appointed to replace him; since the local government could not function without a mayor, that meant that it would undoubtedly collapse, throwing the town into chaos. The mayor stayed. When Arab teachers throughout...