Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the
Gush Dan
Gush Dan (, ) or Tel Aviv metropolitan area is a conurbation in Israel, located along the country's Mediterranean coastline. There is no single formal definition of Gush Dan, though the term is in frequent use by both governmental bodies and the ...
metropolitan area of
Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...
. Located on the
Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a population of 495,600, it is the
economic
An economy is an area of the Production (economics), production, Distribution (economics), distribution and trade, as well as Consumption (economics), consumption of Goods (economics), goods and Service (economics), services. In general, it is ...
and
technological
Technology is the application of conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible tools such as ute ...
center of the country and a global
high tech hub. If
East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem (, ; , ) is the portion of Jerusalem that was Jordanian annexation of the West Bank, held by Jordan after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, as opposed to West Jerusalem, which was held by Israel. Captured and occupied in 1967, th ...
is considered part of Israel, Tel Aviv is the country's second-most-populous city, after
Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
; if not, Tel Aviv is the most populous city, ahead of
West Jerusalem
West Jerusalem or Western Jerusalem (, ; , ) refers to the section of Jerusalem that was controlled by Israel at the end of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. As the city was divided by the Green Line (Israel's erstwhile border, established by ...
.
Tel Aviv is governed by the
Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality, headed by Mayor
Ron Huldai
Ron Huldai (; born 26 August 1944) is an Israeli politician and businessman who has been Mayor of Tel Aviv since 1998. Before taking office as mayor, Huldai served as a fighter pilot and commander in the Israeli Air Force. After leaving the ...
, and is home to most of Israel's
foreign embassies. It is a
beta+ world city and is ranked 53rd in the 2022
Global Financial Centres Index
The Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI) ranks the competitiveness of financial centres based on over 29,000 assessments from an online questionnaire and over 100 indices from organisations such as the World Bank, the Organisation for Economic Co ...
. Tel Aviv has the
third- or fourth-largest economy and the largest economy
per capita
''Per capita'' is a Latin phrase literally meaning "by heads" or "for each head", and idiomatically used to mean "per person".
Social statistics
The term is used in a wide variety of social science, social sciences and statistical research conte ...
in the
Middle East
The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq.
The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...
.
Tel Aviv is ranked the 4th top global startup ecosystem hub.
The city currently has the highest cost of living in the world.
Tel Aviv receives over 2.5 million international visitors annually.
Tel Aviv is home to
Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University (TAU) is a Public university, public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and ...
, the largest university in the country with more than 30,000 students.
The city was founded in 1909 by the
Yishuv
The Yishuv (), HaYishuv Ha'ivri (), or HaYishuv HaYehudi Be'Eretz Yisra'el () was the community of Jews residing in Palestine prior to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. The term came into use in the 1880s, when there were about 2 ...
(
Jewish
Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
residents) and initially given the Hebrew name ''Ahuzat Bayit'' (, 'House Estate' or 'Homestead'),
namesake
A namesake is a person, place, or thing bearing the name of another. Most commonly, it refers to an individual who is purposely named after another (e.g. John F. Kennedy Jr would be the namesake of John F. Kennedy). In common parlance, it may ...
of the Jewish association which established the neighbourhood as a modern housing estate on the outskirts of the ancient
port city
A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Hamburg, Manche ...
of
Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
(''Yafo'' in Hebrew), then part of the
Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem
The Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem (, ; , , ), also known as the Sanjak of Jerusalem, was a district in Ottoman Syria with special administrative status established in 1872.Büssow (2011), p5Abu-Manneh (1999), p39Jankowski & Gershoni (1997), p174 T ...
within the
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...
. Its name was changed the following year to Tel Aviv, after the biblical name
Tel Abib ( "
Tell of Spring") adopted by
Nahum Sokolow
Nahum ben Joseph Samuel Sokolow ( ''Nachum ben Yosef Shmuel Soqolov'', ; 10 January 1859 – 17 May 1936) was a Jewish-Polish people, Polish writer, translator, and journalist, the fifth President of the World Zionist Organization, editor of ''H ...
as the title for his Hebrew translation of
Theodor Herzl
Theodor Herzl (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austria-Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Jewish journalist and lawyer who was the father of Types of Zionism, modern political Zionism. Herzl formed the World Zionist Organization, Zionist Organizat ...
's 1902 novel
''Altneuland'' ("Old New Land"). Other Jewish suburbs of Jaffa had been established before Tel Aviv, the oldest among them being
Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
.
Tel Aviv was given township status within the Jaffa Municipality in 1921, and became independent from Jaffa in 1934.
Page 1: "Once Tel Aviv had won municipal status (the so-called Tel Aviv Township) in 1921, it strove to amend the relevant legislation by rescission of the clauses that placed it under Jaffa municipality's supervision. In the succeeding years, this question became increasingly to the fore, and demanded a speedy solution. Together with the Tel Aviv's ambition of independence as a Hebrew city with its own autonomous Hebrew government, some members of the township's council did not favour separation from the mother city Jaffa. In the mid-1920s, the view consoli- dated among the town councillors that Tel Aviv's subjection to Jaffa municipality had to be annulled, and it must be granted its deserved status as an independent Hebrew city."
Page 3: "Tel Aviv municipality strove for full municipal rights, for the status of a municipality with all its implications, in this way enjoying absolute independence. Yet it still wished to maintain its interests in Jaffa. Most obvious was the desire not to lose the Jewish influence in the Jaffa municipality, as well as reinforcing the clout of the Jews on the municipal council. In Tel Aviv's view, Jaffa enjoyed important status not only locally. At that time it was second in importance in Palestine only to Jerusalem, and was followed by Haifa, Safed and Tiberias."
Page 4: "...the Mandate government took a positive view of Tel Aviv's desire for full municipal independence. But at that stage it refrained from making any changes at all in Tel Aviv's municipal status. From the closing years of the 1920s, the authorities immersed themselves in the preparation of a new framework for the Municipalities Law, which was intended to replace the Ottoman law. So as long as the new law was incomplete, the authorities avoided any change in the municipal status of Tel Aviv. ootnote: The new Municipalities Order was published in 1934. That year Tel Aviv gained full municipal independence, becoming a municipal corporation.[M. Gorion (Wager), Introduction to the History of Local Government in Israel (Jerusalem: University of Tel Aviv, 1957), pp.184–5 ebrew] Immigration by mostly Jewish refugees meant that the growth of Tel Aviv soon outpaced that of Jaffa, which had a majority
Arab
Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world.
Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...
population at the time. In 1948, the
Israeli Declaration of Independence
The Israeli Declaration of Independence, formally the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel (), was proclaimed on 14 May 1948 (5 Iyar 5708), at the end of the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war phase and ...
was proclaimed in the city, with Tel Aviv named as the founding capital of Israel – a function it retained officially until 1950. After the
1947–1949 Palestine war
The 1948 Palestine war was fought in the territory of what had been, at the start of the war, British-ruled Mandatory Palestine. During the war, the British withdrew from Palestine, Zionism, Zionist forces conquered territory and established ...
, Tel Aviv began the
municipal annexation
Municipal annexation is the legal process by which a city or other municipality acquires land as its jurisdictional territory (as opposed to simply owning the land the way individuals do). The annexed land is typically not part of any other munic ...
of parts of Jaffa, fully unified with Jaffa under the name Tel Aviv in April 1950, and was formally renamed to Tel Aviv-Yafo in August 1950.
Tel Aviv's
White City, designated a
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...
World Heritage Site
World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...
in 2003, comprises the world's largest concentration of
International Style
The International Style is a major architectural style and movement that began in western Europe in the 1920s and dominated modern architecture until the 1970s. It is defined by strict adherence to Functionalism (architecture), functional and Fo ...
buildings, including
Bauhaus
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the , was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined Decorative arts, crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., ...
and other related
modernist architectural styles.
Popular attractions include
Old Jaffa, the
Eretz Israel Museum
The Eretz Israel Museum (also known as Muza) is a historical and archaeological museum in the Ramat Aviv neighborhood of Tel Aviv, Israel.
Eretz Israel Museum, established in 1953, has a large display of archaeological, anthropological and h ...
, the
Museum of Art,
Yarkon Park
Yarkon Park (, ''Park HaYarkon'') is a park in Tel Aviv, Israel, with about sixteen million visits annually. Named after the Yarkon River, which flows through it, the park includes extensive lawns, sports facilities, botanical gardens, an aviar ...
, and the
city's promenade and beach.
Etymology and origins
''Tel Aviv'' is the Hebrew title of
Theodor Herzl
Theodor Herzl (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austria-Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Jewish journalist and lawyer who was the father of Types of Zionism, modern political Zionism. Herzl formed the World Zionist Organization, Zionist Organizat ...
’s 1902 novel ("Old New Land"), as translated from German by
Nahum Sokolow
Nahum ben Joseph Samuel Sokolow ( ''Nachum ben Yosef Shmuel Soqolov'', ; 10 January 1859 – 17 May 1936) was a Jewish-Polish people, Polish writer, translator, and journalist, the fifth President of the World Zionist Organization, editor of ''H ...
. Sokolow had adopted the name of a
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia is a historical region of West Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent. Today, Mesopotamia is known as present-day Iraq and forms the eastern geographic boundary of ...
n site near the city of Babylon mentioned in
Ezekiel
Ezekiel, also spelled Ezechiel (; ; ), was an Israelite priest. The Book of Ezekiel, relating his visions and acts, is named after him.
The Abrahamic religions acknowledge Ezekiel as a prophet. According to the narrative, Ezekiel prophesied ...
: "Then I came to them of the captivity at
el Aviv that lived by the
river Chebar, and to where they lived; and I sat there overwhelmed among them seven days."
The name was chosen in 1910 from several suggestions, including "
Herzliya
Herzliya ( ; , / ) is an affluent List of Israeli cities, city in the Israeli coastal plain, central coast of Israel, at the northern part of the Tel Aviv District, known for its robust start-up and entrepreneurial culture. In it had a populatio ...
". It was found fitting as it embraced the idea of a renaissance in the ancient Jewish homeland. ''Aviv'' (, or ''Abib'') is a Hebrew word that can be translated as "spring", symbolizing renewal, and ''
tell'' (or ''tel'') is an artificial mound created over centuries through the accumulation of successive layers of civilization built one over the other and symbolizing the ancient.
Although founded in 1909 as a small settlement on the sand dunes north of Jaffa, Tel Aviv was envisaged as a future city from the start. Its founders hoped that in contrast to what they perceived as the squalid and unsanitary conditions of neighbouring Arab towns, Tel Aviv was to be a clean and modern city, inspired by the European cities of
Warsaw
Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...
and
Odesa
Odesa, also spelled Odessa, is the third most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern ...
.
The marketing pamphlets advocating for its establishment stated:
History
Jaffa

The
walled city
The following cities have, or historically had, defensive walls.
Africa Algeria
* Algiers
* Ghardaïa
* Timimoun
Egypt
See List of Egypt castles, forts, fortifications and city walls.
* Al-Fustat
* Cairo
* Damietta
Ethiopia
* Harar
Libya
*Apo ...
of
Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
is modern-day Tel Aviv-Yafo's only urban centre that existed in early modern times. Jaffa was an important port city in the region for millennia. Archaeological evidence shows signs of human settlement there starting in roughly 7,500 BC. The city was established around 1,800 BC at the latest. Its natural harbour has been used since the
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...
. By the time Tel Aviv was founded as a separate city during
Ottoman rule of the region, Jaffa had been ruled by the
Canaan
CanaanThe current scholarly edition of the Septuagint, Greek Old Testament spells the word without any accents, cf. Septuaginta : id est Vetus Testamentum graece iuxta LXX interprets. 2. ed. / recogn. et emendavit Robert Hanhart. Stuttgart : D ...
ites,
Egyptians
Egyptians (, ; , ; ) are an ethnic group native to the Nile, Nile Valley in Egypt. Egyptian identity is closely tied to Geography of Egypt, geography. The population is concentrated in the Nile Valley, a small strip of cultivable land stretchi ...
,
Philistines
Philistines (; LXX: ; ) were ancient people who lived on the south coast of Canaan during the Iron Age in a confederation of city-states generally referred to as Philistia.
There is compelling evidence to suggest that the Philistines origi ...
,
Israelites
Israelites were a Hebrew language, Hebrew-speaking ethnoreligious group, consisting of tribes that lived in Canaan during the Iron Age.
Modern scholarship describes the Israelites as emerging from indigenous Canaanites, Canaanite populations ...
,
Assyrians
Assyrians (, ) are an ethnic group indigenous to Mesopotamia, a geographical region in West Asia. Modern Assyrians share descent directly from the ancient Assyrians, one of the key civilizations of Mesopotamia. While they are distinct from ot ...
,
Babylonians
Babylonia (; , ) was an ancient Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Kuwait, Syria and Iran). It emerged as an Akkadian-populated but Amorite-ru ...
,
Persians
Persians ( ), or the Persian people (), are an Iranian ethnic group from West Asia that came from an earlier group called the Proto-Iranians, which likely split from the Indo-Iranians in 1800 BCE from either Afghanistan or Central Asia. They ...
,
Phoenicia
Phoenicians were an Ancient Semitic-speaking peoples, ancient Semitic group of people who lived in the Phoenician city-states along a coastal strip in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily modern Lebanon and the Syria, Syrian ...
ns,
Ptolemies
The Ptolemaic dynasty (; , ''Ptolemaioi''), also known as the Lagid dynasty (, ''Lagidai''; after Ptolemy I's father, Lagus), was a Macedonian Greek royal house which ruled the Ptolemaic Kingdom in Ancient Egypt during the Hellenistic period. ...
,
Seleucids
The Seleucid Empire ( ) was a Greek state in West Asia during the Hellenistic period. It was founded in 312 BC by the Macedonian general Seleucus I Nicator, following the division of the Macedonian Empire founded by Alexander the Great, ...
,
Hasmoneans,
Romans,
Byzantines,
the early Islamic caliphates,
Crusaders
The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and at times directed by the Papacy during the Middle Ages. The most prominent of these were the campaigns to the Holy Land aimed at reclaiming Jerusalem and its surrounding ...
,
Ayyubids
The Ayyubid dynasty (), also known as the Ayyubid Sultanate, was the founding dynasty of the medieval Sultanate of Egypt established by Saladin in 1171, following his abolition of the Fatimid Caliphate of Egypt. A Sunni Muslim of Kurdish ori ...
, and
Mamluk
Mamluk or Mamaluk (; (singular), , ''mamālīk'' (plural); translated as "one who is owned", meaning "slave") were non-Arab, ethnically diverse (mostly Turkic, Caucasian, Eastern and Southeastern European) enslaved mercenaries, slave-so ...
s before coming under Ottoman rule in 1515. It had been fought over numerous times. The city is mentioned in ancient Egyptian documents, as well as the
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;["Tanach"](_blank)
. '' Tell Qasile
Tell Qasile is an archaeological site near the Yarkon River in Tel Aviv, Israel. Over 3,000 years old, the site contains the remains of a port city founded by the Philistines in the 12th century BC.
Prior to 1948, it was on the village lands of ...
,
Tel Gerisa
Tel Gerisa () or Tell Jerishe and Tell Jarisha (Arabic), commonly known as Tel Napoleon (), as his army camped on it during the siege of Jaffa, is an archaeological site in Tel Aviv, Israel, on the southern bank of the Yarkon River. The Tel measu ...
,
Abattoir Hill,
Tel Hashash, and
Tell Qudadi.
During the
First Aliyah
The First Aliyah (), also known as the agriculture Aliyah, was a major wave of Jewish immigration (''aliyah'') to History of Israel#Ottoman period , Ottoman Palestine (region) , Palestine between 1881 and 1903. Jews who migrated in this wave cam ...
in the 1880s, when Jewish immigrants began arriving in the region in significant numbers, new Jewish neighborhoods were founded outside Jaffa on the current territory of Tel Aviv. The first was
Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
, founded in 1887 by
Mizrahi Jews
Mizrahi Jews (), also known as ''Mizrahim'' () in plural and ''Mizrahi'' () in singular, and alternatively referred to as Oriental Jews or ''Edot HaMizrach'' (, ), are terms used in Israeli discourse to refer to a grouping of Jews, Jewish c ...
due to overcrowding in Jaffa and built on lands owned by
Aharon Chelouche.
Other neighborhoods were
Neve Shalom
Neve Shalom (), also known as Wahat as-Salam () is a cooperative village in Israel, jointly founded by Israeli Jews and Arabs in an attempt to show that the two peoples can live side by side peacefully, as well as to conduct educational work f ...
(1890),
Yafa Nof (1896),
Achva (1899),
Ohel Moshe (1904),
Kerem HaTeimanim
Kerem HaTeimanim (, lit. "Vineyard of the Yemenites") is a neighborhood in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel. The neighborhood is adjacent to the Carmel Market
Carmel Market (, ''Shuk HaCarmel'') is an outdoor marketplace in Tel Aviv, Israel.
...
(1906), and others. Once Tel Aviv received city status in the 1920s, those neighborhoods joined the newly formed municipality, now becoming separated from Jaffa.
Foundation in Late Ottoman period (1904–1917)

The
Second Aliyah
The Second Aliyah () was an aliyah (Jewish immigration to the Land of Israel) that took place between 1904 and 1914, during which approximately 35,000 Jews, mostly from Russia, with some from Yemen, immigrated into Ottoman Palestine.
The Sec ...
led to further expansion. In 1906, a group of Jews, among them residents of Jaffa, followed the initiative of
Akiva Aryeh Weiss and banded together to form the ''Ahuzat Bayit'' () society. One of the society's goals was to form a "Hebrew urban centre in a healthy environment, planned according to the rules of aesthetics and modern hygiene". The urban planning for the new city was influenced by the
garden city movement
The garden city movement was a 20th century urban planning movement promoting satellite communities surrounding the central city and separated with Green belt, greenbelts. These Garden Cities would contain proportionate areas of residences, i ...
.
The first 60 plots were purchased in Kerem Djebali (Karm al-Jabali) near Jaffa by
Jacobus Kann, a Dutch citizen, who registered them in his name to circumvent the Turkish prohibition on Jewish land acquisition.
Meir Dizengoff
Meir Dizengoff (; born Meer Yankelevich Dizengof, ); 25 February 1861 – 23 September 1936) was a Zionism, Zionist leader and politician and the founder and first Mayor of Tel Aviv, mayor of Tel Aviv (1911–1922 as head of town planning, 1922� ...
, later Tel Aviv's first
mayor
In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...
, also joined the Ahuzat Bayit society. His vision for Tel Aviv involved peaceful co-existence with Arabs.
On 11 April 1909, 66 Jewish families gathered on a desolate sand dune to parcel out the land by lottery using seashells. This gathering is considered the official date of the establishment of Tel Aviv. The lottery was organised by
Akiva Aryeh Weiss, president of the building society.
Weiss collected 120 sea shells on the beach, half of them white and half of them grey. The members' names were written on the white shells and the plot numbers on the grey shells. A boy drew names from one box of shells and a girl drew plot numbers from the second box. A photographer, Abraham Soskin (b. 1881 in Russia, made ''
aliyah
''Aliyah'' (, ; ''ʿălīyyā'', ) is the immigration of Jews from Jewish diaspora, the diaspora to, historically, the geographical Land of Israel or the Palestine (region), Palestine region, which is today chiefly represented by the Israel ...
'' 1906), documented the event. The first water well was later dug at this site, located on what is today
Rothschild Boulevard
Rothschild Boulevard (, ''Sderot Rotshild'') is one of the principal streets in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel, beginning in Neve Tzedek at its southwestern edge and running north to Habima Theatre. It is one of the most expensive streets in the ...
, across from Dizengoff House. Within a year,
Herzl Herzl is both a given name and a surname. Notable people with the name include:
Given name:
*Herzl Berger
*Herzl Bodinger
*Herzl Rosenblum
*Herzl Yankl Tsam
* Herzl "Herzi" Halevi
Surname:
* Ludwig Herzl
*Theodor Herzl
See also
*Mount Herzl
*' ...
,
Ahad Ha'am
Asher Zvi Hirsch Ginsberg (18 August 1856 – 2 January 1927), primarily known by his Hebrew name and pen name Ahad Ha'am (, lit. 'one of the people', ), was a Hebrew journalist and essayist, and one of the foremost pre-state Zionist thinkers. ...
,
Yehuda Halevi
Judah haLevi (also Yehuda Halevi or ha-Levi; ; ; c. 1075 – 1141) was a Sephardic Jewish poet, physician and philosopher. Halevi is considered one of the greatest Hebrew poets and is celebrated for his secular and religious poems, many of whic ...
,
Lilienblum, and Rothschild streets were built; a water system was installed; and 66 houses (including some on six subdivided plots) were completed.
At the end of Herzl Street, a plot was allocated for a new building for the
Herzliya Hebrew High School
The Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium (, also known as ''Gymnasia Herzliya''), originally known as HaGymnasia HaIvrit (lit. Hebrew High School) is a historic high school in Tel Aviv, Israel, whose faculty and alumni includes many people influential in t ...
, founded in Jaffa in 1906.
The cornerstone for the building was laid on 28 July 1909. The town was originally named Ahuzat Bayit ("Homestead" in Hebrew). On 21 May 1910, the name Tel Aviv was adopted.
The flag and city arms of Tel Aviv (see above) contain under the red Star of David 2 words from the biblical book of Jeremiah: "I (God) will build You up again and you will be rebuilt." (Jer 31:4) Tel Aviv was planned as an independent Hebrew city with wide streets and boulevards, running water for each house, and street lights.
By 1914, Tel Aviv had grown to more than .
In 1915 a census of Tel Aviv was conducted, recording a population 2,679. However, growth halted in 1917 when the
Ottoman authorities
expelled the residents of Jaffa and Tel Aviv as a wartime measure.
A report published in ''The New York Times'' by United States Consul Garrels in
Alexandria, Egypt
Alexandria ( ; ) is the List of cities and towns in Egypt#Largest cities, second largest city in Egypt and the List of coastal settlements of the Mediterranean Sea, largest city on the Mediterranean coast. It lies at the western edge of the Nile ...
described the Jaffa deportation of early April 1917. The orders of evacuation were aimed chiefly at the Jewish population.
Jews were free to return to their homes in Tel Aviv at the end of the following year when, with the end of World War I and the defeat of the Ottomans, the British took control of Palestine.
The town had rapidly become an attraction to immigrants, with a local activist writing:
British administration (1917–1934)
Tel Aviv, along with the rest of the Jaffa municipality, was conquered by the
British imperial army in late 1917 during the
Sinai and Palestine Campaign
The Sinai and Palestine campaign was part of the Middle Eastern theatre of World War I, taking place between January 1915 and October 1918. The British Empire, the French Third Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy fought alongside the Arab Revol ...
of
World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
and became part of British-administered
Mandatory Palestine
Mandatory Palestine was a British Empire, British geopolitical entity that existed between 1920 and 1948 in the Palestine (region), region of Palestine, and after 1922, under the terms of the League of Nations's Mandate for Palestine.
After ...
until 1948.
Tel Aviv, established as suburb of Jaffa, received "township" or local council status within the Jaffa Municipality in 1921.
[ According to a ]census
A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...
conducted in 1922 by the British Mandate authorities, Tel Aviv had a population of 15,185 (15,065 Jews, 78 Muslims and 42 Christians). The population of Tel Aviv had increased to around 34,000 by 1925. The 1931 census recorded Tel Aviv as having a population of 46,101 (45,564 Jews, 288 with no religion, 143 Christians, and 106 Muslims) in 12,545 houses.[Mills, 1932, p]
15
/ref>
With increasing Jewish immigration during the British administration, friction between Arabs and Jews in Palestine increased. On 1 May 1921, the Jaffa riots
The Jaffa riots (commonly known in ) were a series of violent riots in Mandatory Palestine on May 1–7, 1921, which began as a confrontation between two Jewish groups but developed into an attack by Arabs on Jews and then reprisal attacks by ...
resulted in the deaths of 48 Arabs and 47 Jews and injuries to 146 Jews and 73 Arabs. In the wake of this violence, many Jews left Jaffa for Tel Aviv.
Tel Aviv began to develop as a commercial center. In 1923, Tel Aviv was the first town to be wired to electricity in Palestine, followed by Jaffa later in the same year. The opening ceremony of the Jaffa Electric Company powerhouse, on 10 June 1923, celebrated the lighting of the two main streets of Tel Aviv.
In 1925, the Scottish biologist, sociologist, philanthropist and pioneering town planner Patrick Geddes
Sir Patrick Geddes (2 October 1854 – 17 April 1932) was a Scottish biologist, sociologist, Comtean positivist, geographer, philanthropist and pioneering town planner. He is known for his innovative thinking in the fields of urban plannin ...
drew up the Geddes Plan for Tel Aviv, a master plan for Tel Aviv which was adopted by the city council led by Meir Dizengoff
Meir Dizengoff (; born Meer Yankelevich Dizengof, ); 25 February 1861 – 23 September 1936) was a Zionism, Zionist leader and politician and the founder and first Mayor of Tel Aviv, mayor of Tel Aviv (1911–1922 as head of town planning, 1922� ...
. Geddes's plan for developing the northern part of the township was based on Ebenezer Howard
Sir Ebenezer Howard (29 January 1850 – 1 May 1928) was an English urban planner and founder of the garden city movement, known for his publication '' To-Morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform'' (1898), the description of a utopian city in wh ...
's garden city movement
The garden city movement was a 20th century urban planning movement promoting satellite communities surrounding the central city and separated with Green belt, greenbelts. These Garden Cities would contain proportionate areas of residences, i ...
. The plan consisted of four main features: a hierarchical system of streets laid out in a grid, large blocks consisting of small-scale domestic dwellings, the organization of these blocks around central open spaces, and the concentration of cultural institutions to form a civic center. While most of the northern area of Tel Aviv was built according to this plan, the influx of European refugees in the 1930s necessitated the construction of taller apartment buildings on a larger footprint in the city.
Ben Gurion House was built in 1930–31, part of a new workers' housing development. At the same time, Jewish cultural life was given a boost by the establishment of the Ohel Theatre and the decision of Habima Theatre
The Habima Theatre ( ''Te'atron HaBima'', lit. "The Stage Theatre") is the List of national theatres, national theatre of Israel and one of the first Hebrew language theatres. It is located in Habima Square in the center of Tel Aviv.
History
...
to make Tel Aviv its permanent base in 1931.
1934 municipal independence from Jaffa
Tel Aviv was granted the status of an independent municipality separate from Jaffa in 1934.[ The Jewish population rose dramatically during the ]Fifth Aliyah
The Fifth Aliyah () refers to the fifth wave of the Jewish immigration to Palestine from Europe and Asia between the years 1929 and 1939, with the arrival of 225,000 to 300,000 Jews. The Fifth Aliyah, or fifth immigration wave, began after the co ...
after the Nazis came to power in Germany. Many new Jewish immigrants to Palestine disembarked in Jaffa, and remained in Tel Aviv, turning the city into a center of urban life. Friction during the 1936–39 Arab revolt led to the opening of a local Jewish port, Tel Aviv Port
The Tel Aviv Port (; ) is a commercial and entertainment district in northwest Tel Aviv, Israel along the Mediterranean Sea.
History
In 1933, the Levant Fair was opened next to the waterfront area that would soon become the Tel Aviv Port.
Act ...
, independent of Jaffa, in 1938. It closed on 25 October 1965. Lydda Airport
Ben Gurion International Airport , commonly known by the Hebrew language, Hebrew-language acronym (), is the main international airport of Israel. Situated on outskirts north of the city of Lod and directly south of the city of Or Yehuda, i ...
(later Ben Gurion Airport) and Sde Dov Airport
Sde Dov Airport (, ''lit.'' Dov Field, ), also known as Dov Hoz Airport (, ''Nemal HaTe'ufa Dov Hoz'', ) was an airport in Tel Aviv, Israel that mainly handled scheduled domestic flights to Eilat, northern Israel (Haifa, the Galilee, and the G ...
opened between 1937 and 1938. According to the Jewish Virtual Library
The Jewish Virtual Library (JVL, formerly known as JSOURCE) is an online encyclopedia published by the American foreign policy analyst Mitchell Bard's non-profit organization American–Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE). It is a website cove ...
, the Jewish population of Tel Aviv had risen to 150,000 by 1937, compared to Jaffa's mainly Arab 69,000 residents, and by 1939 rose to 160,000, which was over a third of Palestine's total Jewish population. The village statistics of 1938 listed Tel Aviv's population as 140,000, all Jews.
Many German Jewish
The history of the Jews in Germany goes back at least to the year 321 CE, and continued through the Early Middle Ages (5th to 10th centuries CE) and High Middle Ages (c. 1000–1299 CE) when Jewish immigrants founded the Ashkenazi Jewish commu ...
architects trained at the Bauhaus
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the , was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined Decorative arts, crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., ...
, the Modernist
Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...
school of architecture in Germany, and left Germany during the 1930s. Some, like Arieh Sharon, came to Palestine and adapted the architectural outlook of the Bauhaus and similar schools to the local conditions there, creating what is recognized as the largest concentration of buildings in the International Style in the world.
Tel Aviv's White City emerged in the 1930s, and became a UNESCO World Heritage Site
World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...
in 2003. During World War II, Tel Aviv was hit by Italian airstrikes on 9 September 1940, which killed 137 people in the city.
The village statistics of 1945 listed Tel Aviv's population as 166,660, consisting of 166,000 Jews, 300 "other", 230 Christians, and 130 Muslims.
During the Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine
The Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine, known in the United Kingdom as the Palestine Emergency, was a paramilitary campaign carried out by Zionist militias and underground groups—including Haganah, Lehi (militant group), Lehi, and Irgun ...
, Jewish Irgun
The Irgun (), officially the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel, often abbreviated as Etzel or IZL (), was a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of th ...
and Lehi guerrillas launched repeated attacks against British military, police, and government targets in the city. In 1946, following the King David Hotel bombing
The British administrative headquarters for Mandatory Palestine, housed in the southern wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, were bombed in a terrorist attack on 22 July 1946, by the militant right-wing Zionist underground organization I ...
, the British carried out Operation Shark, in which the entire city was searched for Jewish militants and most of the residents questioned, during which the entire city was placed under curfew. During the March 1947 martial law in Mandatory Palestine, Tel Aviv was placed under martial law by the British authorities for 15 days, with the residents kept under curfew for all but three hours a day as British forces scoured the city for militants. In spite of this, Jewish guerrilla attacks continued in Tel Aviv and other areas under martial law in Palestine.
According to the 1947 UN Partition Plan
The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was a proposal by the United Nations to partition Mandatory Palestine at the end of the British Mandate. Drafted by the U.N. Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) on 3 September 1947, the Pl ...
for dividing Palestine into Jewish and Arab states, Tel Aviv was to be included in the proposed Jewish state
In world politics, Jewish state is a characterization of Israel as the nation-state and sovereign homeland for the Jewish people.
Overview
Modern Israel came into existence on 14 May 1948 as a polity to serve as the homeland for the Jewi ...
. Jaffa with, as of 1945, a population of 101,580 people—53,930 Muslims, 30,820 Jews and 16,800 Christians—was designated as part of the Arab state. Civil War
A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same Sovereign state, state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.J ...
broke out in the country and in particular between the neighbouring cities of Tel Aviv and Jaffa, which had been assigned to the Jewish and Arab states respectively. After several months of siege, on 13 May 1948, Jaffa fell and the Arab population fled en masse.
State of Israel
After Israel declared Independence on 14 May 1948, Tel Aviv was the temporary government center of the State of Israel. The city was repeatedly bombed by Egyptian warplanes and shelled by Egyptian warships during the Israeli War of Independence, killing around 150 people. The most significant attack was the bombing of the central bus station, in which 42 people were killed. On 3 June 1948, the Israeli Air Force
The Israeli Air Force (IAF; , commonly known as , ''Kheil HaAvir'', "Air Corps") operates as the aerial and space warfare branch of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). It was founded on May 28, 1948, shortly after the Israeli Declaration of Indep ...
scored its first aerial victory over Tel Aviv when Israeli fighter pilot Modi Alon
Mordechai "Modi" Alon (; 17 January 1921 – 16 October 1948) was an Israeli fighter pilot who with the formation of the Israeli Air Force in May 1948, assumed command of its first fighter squadron. Flying the Avia S-199, Alon participated in t ...
shot down two Egyptian bombers during a raid. The city was also the scene of fighting between the Israel Defense Forces
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...
and Irgun
The Irgun (), officially the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel, often abbreviated as Etzel or IZL (), was a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of th ...
during the Altalena Affair
The ''Altalena'' Affair was a violent confrontation that took place in June 1948 between the newly created Israel Defense Forces and the Irgun (also known as Etzel), one of the Jewish paramilitary groups that were in the process of merging to ...
, in which the IDF stopped an Irgun attempt to import arms for its own use.
In December 1949, the Israeli government relocated to Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
. Due to the international dispute over the status of Jerusalem
The status of Jerusalem has been described as "one of the most intractable issues in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict" due to the long-running territorial dispute between Israel and the Palestinians, both of which claim it as their capital ...
, most embassies remained in or near Tel Aviv. The boundaries of Tel Aviv and Jaffa became a matter of contention between the Tel Aviv municipality and the Israeli government in 1948. The former wished to incorporate only the northern Jewish suburbs of Jaffa, while the latter wanted a more complete unification. The issue also had international sensitivity, since the main part of Jaffa was in the Arab portion of the United Nations Partition Plan
The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was a proposal by the United Nations to partition Mandatory Palestine at the end of the British Mandate. Drafted by the U.N. Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) on 3 September 1947, the Pl ...
, whereas Tel Aviv was not, and no armistice agreements had yet been signed. On 10 December 1948, the government announced the annexation to Tel Aviv of Jaffa's Jewish suburbs, the Palestinian
Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine.
*: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenous p ...
neighborhood of Abu Kabir
Abu Kabir () was a satellite village of Jaffa founded by Egypt following Ibrahim Pasha's 1832 defeat of Turkish forces in Ottoman era Palestine. During the 1948 Palestine war, it was mostly abandoned and later destroyed. After Israel's establ ...
, the Arab village of Salama and some of its agricultural land, and the Jewish Hatikva Quarter
Hatikva Quarter (, ''Shkhunat Hatikva'') is a working class Neighborhoods of Tel Aviv, neighbourhood in southeastern Tel Aviv, Israel. History
The quarter was founded in 1935, named for "Mount Hope, Jaffa, Mount Hope" ("Har HaTikva" in Hebrew), a ...
. On 25 February 1949, the depopulated Palestinian village of al-Shaykh Muwannis
Al-Shaykh Muwannis (), also Sheikh Munis, was a small Palestinian people, Palestinian Arab village in the Jaffa Subdistrict, Mandatory Palestine, Jaffa Subdistrict of Mandatory Palestine, located approximately 8.5 kilometers from the center of J ...
was also annexed to Tel Aviv. On 18 May 1949, Manshiya and part of Jaffa's central zone were added, for the first time including land that had been in the Arab portion of the UN partition plan. The government voted on the unification of Tel Aviv and Jaffa on 4 October 1949, but the decision was not implemented until 24 April 1950 due to the opposition of Tel Aviv mayor Israel Rokach
Israel Rokach, Order of the British Empire, Honorary CBE (; December 31, 1896 – September 13, 1959) was an Israeli politician, Knesset member, and the fourth Mayor of Tel Aviv from 1936 to 1953.
Biography
Israel Rokach was born in 1896 in Neve ...
. The name of the unified city was Tel Aviv until 19 August 1950, when it was renamed Tel Aviv-Yafo in order to preserve the historical name Jaffa. Tel Aviv thus grew to . In 1949, a memorial to the 60 founders of Tel Aviv was constructed.
In the 1960s, some of the older buildings were demolished, making way for the country's first high-rises. The historic Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium
The Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium (, also known as ''Gymnasia Herzliya''), originally known as HaGymnasia HaIvrit (lit. Hebrew High School) is a historic high school in Tel Aviv, Israel, whose faculty and alumni includes many people influential in t ...
was controversially demolished, to make way for the Shalom Meir Tower
Shalom Meir Tower (, ''Migdal Shalom Meir''; commonly known as Migdal Shalom, ) is an office tower in Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first skyscraper built in Israel.
Overview
Shalom Meir Tower was designed by architects Yitzhak Pearlstein, Gideon ...
, which was completed in 1965, and remained Israel's tallest building until 1999. Tel Aviv's population peaked in the early 1960s at 390,000, representing 16 percent of the country's total. By the early 1970s, Tel Aviv had entered a long and steady period of continuous population decline, which was accompanied by urban decay
Urban decay (also known as urban rot, urban death or urban blight) is the sociological process by which a previously functioning city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude. There is no single process that leads to urban decay. ...
. By 1981, Tel Aviv had entered not just natural population decline, but an absolute population decline as well. In the late 1980s the city had an aging population of 317,000. Construction activity had moved away from the inner ring of Tel Aviv, and had moved to its outer perimeter and adjoining cities. A mass out-migration of residents from Tel Aviv, to adjoining cities like Petah Tikva
Petah Tikva (, ), also spelt Petah Tiqwa and known informally as Em HaMoshavot (), is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, east of Tel Aviv. It was founded in 1878, mainly by Haredi Judaism, Haredi Jews of the Old Y ...
and Rehovot
Rehovot (, / ) is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, about south of Tel Aviv. In it had a population of .
Etymology
Israel Belkind, founder of the Bilu (movement), Bilu movement, proposed the name "Rehovot ...
, where better housing conditions were available, was underway by the beginning of the 1970s, and only accelerated by the Yom Kippur War
The Yom Kippur War, also known as the Ramadan War, the October War, the 1973 Arab–Israeli War, or the Fourth Arab–Israeli War, was fought from 6 to 25 October 1973 between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states led by Egypt and S ...
. Cramped housing conditions and high property prices pushed families out of Tel Aviv and deterred young people from moving in. From the beginning of 1970s, the common image of Tel Aviv became that of a decaying city, as Tel Aviv's population fell 20%.[
]
In the 1970s, the apparent sense of Tel Aviv's urban decline became a theme in the work of novelists such as Yaakov Shabtai
Yaakov Shabtai (; March 8, 1934 – August 4, 1981) was an Israeli novelist, playwright, and translator.
Biography
Shabtai was born in 1934 in Tel Aviv, Mandatory Palestine. In 1957, after completing military service, he joined Kibbutz Merhavia ...
, in works describing the city such as ''Sof Davar'' (''The End of Things'') and ''Zikhron Devarim'' (''The Memory of Things''). A symptomatic article of 1980 asked "Is Tel Aviv Dying?" and portrayed what it saw as the city's existential problems: "Residents leaving the city, businesses penetrating into residential areas, economic and social gaps, deteriorating neighbourhoods, contaminated air – Is the First Hebrew City destined for a slow death? Will it become a ghost town?". However, others saw this as a transitional period. By the late 1980s, attitudes to the city's future had become markedly more optimistic. It had also become a center of nightlife and discotheques for Israelis who lived in the suburbs and adjoining cities. By 1989, Tel Aviv had acquired the nickname "Nonstop City", as a reflection of the growing recognition of its nightlife and 24/7 culture, and "Nonstop City" had to some extent replaced the former moniker of "First Hebrew City". The largest project built in this era was the Dizengoff Center, Israel's first shopping mall, which was completed in 1983. Other notable projects included the construction of Marganit Tower
The Marganit Tower is a skyscraper located in HaKirya, Tel Aviv, Israel. Completed in 1987, the building is in height, although most of this is due to its "finger", a concrete mast with antennas and other transmission equipment. As such, it only ...
in 1987, the opening of the Suzanne Dellal Center for Dance and Theater
The Suzanne Dellal Centre for Dance and Theatre () is a centre for dance in Israel, located in Neve Tzedek, Tel Aviv.
Goals and significance
The Suzanne Dellal Centre for Dance and Theatre presents Israeli and international contemporary dance ...
in 1989, and the Tel Aviv Cinematheque
Tel Aviv Cinematheque (also called: Doron Cinema center) is a cinematheque and movie archive, opened in Tel Aviv on 12 May 1973.
The Cinematheque, located at HaArba'a Street 5, has five screening halls. The Cinematheque programming includes Is ...
(opened in 1973 and located to the current building in 1989).
In the early 1980s, 13 embassies in Jerusalem moved to Tel Aviv as part of the UN's measures responding to Israel's 1980 Jerusalem Law
Jerusalem Law (, ) is a common name of Basic Law: Jerusalem, Capital of Israel passed by the Knesset on 30 July 1980.
Although the law did not use the term, the Israeli Supreme Court interpreted the law as an effective annexation of East Jeru ...
. Today, most national embassies are located in Tel Aviv or environs. In the 1990s, the decline in Tel Aviv's population began to be reversed and stabilized, at first temporarily due to a wave of immigrants from the former Soviet Union
The post-Soviet states, also referred to as the former Soviet Union or the former Soviet republics, are the independent sovereign states that emerged/re-emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Prior to their independence, they ...
. Tel Aviv absorbed 42,000 immigrants from the FSU, many educated in scientific, technological, medical and mathematical fields. In this period, the number of engineers in the city doubled. Tel Aviv soon began to emerge as a global high-tech center. The construction of many skyscrapers
A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Most modern sources define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition, other than being very tall high-rise bui ...
and high-tech office buildings followed. In 1993, Tel Aviv was categorized as a world city
A global city (also known as a power city, world city, alpha city, or world center) is a city that serves as a primary node in the global economic network. The concept originates from geography and urban studies, based on the thesis that glo ...
. However, the city's municipality struggled to cope with an influx of new immigrants. Tel Aviv's tax base had been shrinking for many years, as a result of its preceding long term population decline, and this meant there was little money available at the time to invest in the city's deteriorating infrastructure and housing. In 1998, Tel Aviv was on the "verge of bankruptcy". Economic difficulties would then be compounded by a wave of Palestinian suicide bombings in the city from the mid-1990s, to the end of the Second Intifada, as well as the dot-com bubble
The dot-com bubble (or dot-com boom) was a stock market bubble that ballooned during the late-1990s and peaked on Friday, March 10, 2000. This period of market growth coincided with the widespread adoption of the World Wide Web and the Interne ...
, which affected the city's rapidly growing hi-tech sector. On 4 November 1995, Israel's prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin
Yitzhak Rabin (; , ; 1 March 1922 – 4 November 1995) was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the prime minister of Israel, serving two terms in office, 1974–1977, and from 1992 until Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, his ass ...
, was assassinated at a rally in Tel Aviv in support of the Oslo peace accord. The outdoor plaza where this occurred, formerly known as Kikar Malchei Yisrael, was renamed Rabin Square
Rabin Square (), formerly Kings of Israel Square (), is a main large public city square in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel. Over the years it has been the site of numerous political rallies, parades, and other public events. In 1995, the square ...
.
In the Gulf War
, combatant2 =
, commander1 =
, commander2 =
, strength1 = Over 950,000 soldiers3,113 tanks1,800 aircraft2,200 artillery systems
, page = https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-PEMD-96- ...
in 1991, Tel Aviv was attacked by Scud
A Scud missile is one of a series of tactical ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It was exported widely to both Second and Third World countries. The term comes from the NATO reporting name attached to the m ...
missiles from Iraq. Iraq hoped to provoke an Israeli military response, which could have destroyed the US–Arab alliance. The United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
pressured Israel not to retaliate, and after Israel acquiesced, the US and Netherlands
, Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...
rushed Patriot missile
The MIM-104 Patriot is a mobile interceptor missile surface-to-air missile (SAM) system, the primary such system used by the United States Army and several allied states. It is manufactured by the U.S. defense contractor Raytheon and derives it ...
s to defend against the attacks, but they proved largely ineffective. Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities continued to be hit by Scuds throughout the war, and every city in the Tel Aviv area except for Bnei Brak
Bnei Brak ( ) or Bene Beraq, is a city located on the central Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean Israeli coastal plain, coastal plain in Israel, just east of Tel Aviv. A center of Haredi Judaism, Bnei Brak covers an area of 709 hectares (1,752 acre ...
was hit. A total of 74 Israelis died as a result of the Iraqi attacks, mostly from suffocation and heart attacks, while approximately 230 Israelis were injured. Extensive property damage was also caused, and some 4,000 Israelis were left homeless. It was feared that Iraq would fire missiles filled with nerve agent
Nerve agents, sometimes also called nerve gases, are a class of organic chemistry, organic chemicals that disrupt the mechanisms by which nerves transfer messages to organs. The disruption is caused by the blocking of acetylcholinesterase (ACh ...
s or sarin
Sarin (NATO designation GB nerve_agent#G-series.html" ;"title="hort for nerve agent#G-series">G-series, "B" is an extremely toxic organophosphorus compound.[gas mask
A gas mask is a piece of personal protective equipment used to protect the wearer from inhaling airborne pollutants and toxic gases. The mask forms a sealed cover over the nose and mouth, but may also cover the eyes and other vulnerable soft ...]
s to its citizens. When the first Iraqi missiles hit Israel, some people injected themselves with an antidote for nerve gas. The inhabitants of the southeastern suburb of Hatikva erected an angel-monument as a sign of their gratitude that "it was through a great miracle, that many people were preserved from being killed by a direct hit of a Scud rocket."
Since the First Intifada
The First Intifada (), also known as the First Palestinian Intifada, was a sustained series of Nonviolent resistance, non-violent protests, acts of civil disobedience, Riot, riots, and Terrorism, terrorist attacks carried out by Palestinians ...
, Tel Aviv has suffered from Palestinian political violence
Palestinian political violence refers to acts of violence or terrorism committed by Palestinians with the intent to accomplish political goals in the context of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Common objectives of political violence by Pal ...
. The first suicide attack
A suicide attack (also known by a wide variety of other names, see below) is a deliberate attack in which the perpetrators knowingly sacrifice their own lives as part of the attack. These attacks are a form of murder–suicide that is ofte ...
in Tel Aviv occurred on 19 October 1994, on the Line 5 bus, when a bomber killed 22 civilians and injured 50 as part of a Hamas
The Islamic Resistance Movement, abbreviated Hamas (the Arabic acronym from ), is a Palestinian nationalist Sunni Islam, Sunni Islamism, Islamist political organisation with a military wing, the Qassam Brigades. It has Gaza Strip under Hama ...
suicide campaign. On 6 March 1996, another Hamas suicide bomber killed 13 people (12 civilians and 1 soldier), many of them children, in the Dizengoff Center suicide bombing. Three women were killed by a Hamas terrorist in the Café Apropo bombing on 27 March 1997.
One of the deadliest attacks occurred on 1 June 2001, during the Second Intifada
The Second Intifada (; ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada, was a major uprising by Palestinians against Israel and its Israeli-occupied territories, occupation from 2000. Starting as a civilian uprising in Jerusalem and October 2000 prot ...
, when a suicide bomber exploded at the entrance to the Dolphinarium discothèque, killing 21, mostly teenagers, and injuring 132. Another Hamas suicide bomber killed six civilians and injured 70 in the Allenby Street bus bombing
The Allenby Street bus bombing was a Palestinian suicide bombing that occurred on September 19, 2002 on a Dan bus in the center of Tel Aviv's business district. Six civilians were killed in the attack and approximately 70 were injured. Hamas c ...
. Twenty-three civilians were killed and over 100 injured in the Tel Aviv central bus station massacre. Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades
The al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades () are a Fatah-aligned coalition of Palestinian armed groups in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Created in 2000 amidst the Second Intifada, the Brigades previously operated as the official armed wing of the Fa ...
claimed responsibility for the attack. In the Mike's Place suicide bombing
Mikes may refer to:
* Centre for Metrology and Accreditation, MIKES, Centre for Metrology and Accreditation, Finland, a research organisation
* Mikes (restaurant), a Canadian restaurant chain
* Mikes (surname), a surname
* Mikes, the Hungarian nam ...
, an attack on a bar by a British Muslim
Islam is the second-largest religion in the United Kingdom, with results from the 2021 Census recording just under four million Muslims, or 6.0% of the total population in the United Kingdom. London has the largest population and greatest p ...
suicide bomber resulted in the deaths of three civilians and wounded over 50. Hamas and Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades claimed joint responsibility. An Islamic Jihad bomber killed five and wounded over 50 on 25 February 2005 Stage Club bombing. The most recent suicide attack in the city occurred on 17 April 2006, when 11 people were killed and at least 70 wounded in a suicide bombing near the old central bus station.
Another attack took place on 29 August 2011 in which a Palestinian attacker stole an Israeli taxi cab and rammed it into a police checkpoint guarding the popular Haoman 17
Haoman 17 (, ''lit.'' The Artist 17) is a chain of nightclubs in Israel.
Haoman 17 in Jerusalem has been rated one of the top night clubs in the world. It was opened in 1995 by Ruben Lublin and a group of young promoters from Jerusalem. The Tel ...
nightclub
A nightclub or dance club is a club that is open at night, usually for drinking, dancing and other entertainment. Nightclubs often have a Bar (establishment), bar and discotheque (usually simply known as disco) with a dance floor, laser lighti ...
in Tel Aviv which was filled with 2,000 Israeli teenagers. After crashing, the assailant went on a stabbing spree, injuring eight people. Due to an Israel Border Police
The Israel Border Police () is the gendarmerie and border security branch of the Israel National Police. It is also commonly known by its Hebrew abbreviation Magav (), meaning border guard; its members are colloquially known as ''magavnikim ...
roadblock at the entrance and immediate response of the Border Police team during the subsequent stabbings, a much larger and fatal mass-casualty incident was avoided.
On 21 November 2012, during Operation Pillar of Defense
In November 2012, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched Operation Pillar of Defense (, ''ʿAmúd ʿAnán'', literally: "Pillar of Cloud"), which was an eight-day campaign in the Governance of the Gaza Strip, Hamas-governed Gaza Strip, begi ...
, the Tel Aviv area was targeted by rockets, and air raid sirens were sounded in the city for the first time since the Gulf War
, combatant2 =
, commander1 =
, commander2 =
, strength1 = Over 950,000 soldiers3,113 tanks1,800 aircraft2,200 artillery systems
, page = https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-PEMD-96- ...
. All of the rockets either missed populated areas or were shot down by an Iron Dome
Iron Dome () is an Israeli mobile all-weather air defense system, developed by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israel Aerospace Industries. The system is designed to intercept and destroy short-range rockets and artillery shells fired f ...
rocket defense battery stationed near the city. During the operation, a bomb blast on a bus wounded at least 28 civilians, three seriously. This was described as a terrorist attack by Israel, Russia, and the United States and was condemned by the United Nations, United States, United Kingdom, France and Russia, whilst Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri declared that the organisation "blesses" the attack. More than 300 rockets were fired towards the Tel Aviv Metropolitan area in the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis
The 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis, sometimes called the Unity Intifada, was a major outbreak of violence in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict that mainly commenced on 10 May 2021, and continued until a ceasefire came into effect on 21 May. I ...
.
New laws were introduced to protect Modernist buildings, and efforts to preserve them were aided by UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...
recognition of Tel Aviv's White City as a world heritage site in 2003. In the early 2000s, Tel Aviv municipality focused on attracting more young residents to the city. It made significant investment in major boulevards, to create attractive pedestrian corridors. Former industrial areas like the city's previously derelict Northern Tel Aviv Port
The Tel Aviv Port (; ) is a commercial and entertainment district in northwest Tel Aviv, Israel along the Mediterranean Sea.
History
In 1933, the Levant Fair was opened next to the waterfront area that would soon become the Tel Aviv Port.
Act ...
and the Jaffa railway station, were upgraded and transformed into leisure areas. A process of gentrification began in some of the poor neighborhoods of southern Tel Aviv and many older buildings began to be renovated.
The demographic profile of the city changed in the 2000s, as it began to attract a higher proportion of young residents. By 2012, 28 percent of the city's population was aged between 20 and 34 years old. Between 2007 and 2012, the city's population growth averaged 6.29 percent. As a result of its population recovery and industrial transition, the city's finances were transformed, and by 2012 it was running a budget surplus and maintained a credit rating of AAA+. In the 2000s and early 2010s, Tel Aviv received tens of thousands of illegal immigrants, primarily from Sudan
Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Libya to the northwest, Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the east, Eritrea and Ethiopi ...
and Eritrea
Eritrea, officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa, with its capital and largest city being Asmara. It is bordered by Ethiopia in the Eritrea–Ethiopia border, south, Sudan in the west, and Dj ...
, changing the demographic profile of areas of the city. In 2009, Tel Aviv celebrated its official centennial. In addition to city- and country-wide celebrations, digital collections of historical materials were assembled. These include the History section of the official Tel Aviv-Yafo Centennial Year website; the Ahuzat Bayit collection, which focuses on the founding families of Tel Aviv, and includes photographs and biographies; and Stanford University
Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
's Eliasaf Robinson Tel Aviv Collection, documenting the history of the city. Today, the city is regarded as a strong candidate for global city status.[ Cities in Transition. Ljubljana: Department of Geography, ]University of Ljubljana
The University of Ljubljana (, , ), abbreviated UL, is the oldest and largest university in Slovenia. It has approximately 38,000 enrolled students. The university has 23 faculties and three art academies with approximately 4,000 teaching and re ...
, pp. 183–194. Over the past 60 years, Tel Aviv had developed into a secular
Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin , or or ), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. The origins of secularity can be traced to the Bible itself. The concept was fleshed out through Christian hi ...
, liberal-minded center with a vibrant nightlife and café culture.
Geography
Tel Aviv is located around on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline, in central Israel, the historic land bridge between Europe, Asia and Africa. Immediately north of the ancient port of Jaffa, Tel Aviv lies on land that used to be sand dunes and as such has relatively poor soil fertility
Soil fertility refers to the ability of soil to sustain agricultural plant growth, i.e. to provide plant habitat and result in sustained and consistent yields of high quality. . The land has been flattened and has no important gradients; its most notable geographical features are bluffs above the Mediterranean coastline and the Yarkon River
The Yarkon River, also Yarqon River or Jarkon River (, ''Nahal HaYarkon''; , ''Nahr al-Auja''), is a river in central Israel. The source of the Yarkon ("Greenish" in Hebrew) is at Tel Afek (Antipatris), north of Petah Tikva. It flows west throu ...
mouth. Because of the expansion of Tel Aviv and the Gush Dan region, absolute borders between Tel Aviv and Jaffa and between the city's neighborhoods do not exist.
The city is located northwest of Jerusalem and south of the city of Haifa
Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...
. Neighboring cities and towns include Herzliya
Herzliya ( ; , / ) is an affluent List of Israeli cities, city in the Israeli coastal plain, central coast of Israel, at the northern part of the Tel Aviv District, known for its robust start-up and entrepreneurial culture. In it had a populatio ...
to the north, Ramat HaSharon
Ramat HaSharon (, ) is an affluent city located on Israel's central coastal strip in the south of the Sharon, Israel, Sharon region, bordering the cities of Tel Aviv to the south, Hod HaSharon, Hod-HaSharon to the east, and Herzliya and kibbutz ...
to the northeast, Petah Tikva
Petah Tikva (, ), also spelt Petah Tiqwa and known informally as Em HaMoshavot (), is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, east of Tel Aviv. It was founded in 1878, mainly by Haredi Judaism, Haredi Jews of the Old Y ...
, Bnei Brak
Bnei Brak ( ) or Bene Beraq, is a city located on the central Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean Israeli coastal plain, coastal plain in Israel, just east of Tel Aviv. A center of Haredi Judaism, Bnei Brak covers an area of 709 hectares (1,752 acre ...
, Ramat Gan
Ramat Gan (, ) is a city in the Tel Aviv District of Israel, located east of the municipality of Tel Aviv, and is part of the Gush Dan, Gush Dan metropolitan area. It is home to a Diamond Exchange District (one of the world's major diamond exch ...
and Giv'atayim
Givatayim () is a city in Israel east of Tel Aviv. It is part of the Gush Dan metropolitan area. Givatayim was established in 1922 by pioneers of the Second Aliyah. In it had a population of .
The name of the city comes from the "two hills" on w ...
to the east, Holon
Holon (, ) is a city in the Tel Aviv District of Israel, located south of Tel Aviv. Holon is part of the Gush Dan, Gush Dan metropolitan area. In , it had a population of , making it the List of cities in Israel, tenth most populous city in Isra ...
to the southeast, and Bat Yam
Bat Yam ( ) is a city on Israel's Mediterranean Sea coast, on the Central Coastal Plain just south of Tel Aviv. It is part of the Gush Dan metropolitan area and the Tel Aviv District. In , it had a population of .
History
British Mandate
Bat Y ...
to the south. The city is economically stratified between the north and south. Southern Tel Aviv is considered less affluent than northern Tel Aviv with the exception of Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
and northern and north-western Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
. Central Tel Aviv is home to Azrieli Center
Azrieli Center (; ''Merkaz Azrieli'') is a complex of three skyscrapers in Tel Aviv. At the base of the complex lies a large shopping mall. The complex was designed by Israeli-American architect Eli Attia. After Attia and the developer of the ...
and the important financial and commerce district along Ayalon Highway Ayalon (, ‘place of deer’) is an Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west ...
. The northern side of Tel Aviv is home to Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University (TAU) is a Public university, public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and ...
, Yarkon Park
Yarkon Park (, ''Park HaYarkon'') is a park in Tel Aviv, Israel, with about sixteen million visits annually. Named after the Yarkon River, which flows through it, the park includes extensive lawns, sports facilities, botanical gardens, an aviar ...
, and upscale residential neighborhoods such as Ramat Aviv
Ramat Aviv Alef or Ramat Aviv HaYeruka, and originally plainly Ramat Aviv (, ''lit.'' Spring Heights), is a neighborhood in northwest Tel Aviv, Israel.
History
Ramat Aviv was founded in 1950s following the great influx of immigrants from Eastern ...
and Afeka
file:Afeka_neighborhood.jpg, 250px, Aerial photo of Afeka
Afeka is a neighborhood in the north of the city of Tel Aviv, located north of the Yarkon river, which was established by the commanders of the Haganah for their families.
The neighborhoo ...
.
Environment
Tel Aviv is ranked as the greenest city in Israel. Since 2008, city lights are turned off annually in support of Earth Hour
Earth Hour is a worldwide movement organized by the World Wide Fund for Nature, World Wildlife Fund (WWF). The event is held annually, encouraging the individuals, communities, and businesses to give an hour for Earth, and additionally marked ...
. In February 2009, the municipality launched a water saving campaign, including competition granting free parking for a year to the household that is found to have consumed the least water per person.
In the early 21st century, Tel Aviv's municipality transformed a derelict power station
A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the electricity generation, generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electr ...
into a public park, now named "Gan HaHashmal" ("Electricity Park"), paving the way for eco-friendly
Environment friendly processes, or environmental-friendly processes (also referred to as eco-friendly, nature-friendly, and green), are sustainability and marketing terms referring to goods and services, laws, guidelines and policies that c ...
and environmentally conscious designs.[Electric Tel Aviv](_blank)
by David Kaufman, ''Financial Times
The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...
'', 12 February 2008. In October 2008, Martin Weyl turned an old garbage dump near Ben Gurion International Airport
Ben Gurion International Airport , commonly known by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the main international airport of Israel. Situated on outskirts north of the city of Lod and directly south of the city of Or Yehuda, it is the busies ...
, called Hiriya
Ariel Sharon Park () is an Israeli environmental park. Situated along the lines of the Ayalon River in the area between Ben Gurion Airport and Highway 20 (Ayalon Highway), the area was intended to be the "green lung" of the southern part of t ...
, into an attraction by building an arc of plastic bottles.[Recycling in Israel, Not Just Trash, but the Whole Dump](_blank)
, by Isabel Kershner, 24 October 2007. The site, which was renamed Ariel Sharon Park
Ariel Sharon Park () is an Israeli environmental park. Situated along the lines of the Ayalon River in the area between Ben Gurion Airport and Highway 20 (Ayalon Highway), the area was intended to be the "green lung" of the southern part of t ...
to honor Israel's former prime minister, will serve as the centerpiece in what is to become a urban wilderness on the outskirts of Tel Aviv, designed by German landscape architect
A landscape architect is a person who is educated in the field of landscape architecture. The practice of landscape architecture includes: site analysis, site inventory, site planning, land planning, planting design, grading, storm water manage ...
, Peter Latz
Peter Latz (born 1939) is a German landscape architect and a professor for landscape architecture at the Technical University of Munich. He is best known for his emphasis on reclamation and conversion of former industrialized landscapes. Retired ...
.
At the end of the 20th century, the city began restoring historical neighborhoods such as Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
and many buildings from the 1920s and 1930s. Since 2007, the city hosts its well-known, annual Open House Tel Aviv weekend, which offers the general public free entrance to the city's famous landmarks, private houses and public buildings. In 2010, the design of the renovated Tel Aviv Port (''Nemal Tel Aviv'') won the award for outstanding landscape architecture at the European Biennial for Landscape Architecture in Barcelona
Barcelona ( ; ; ) is a city on the northeastern coast of Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second-most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...
.
In 2014, the Sarona Market Complex opened, following an 8-year renovation project of Sarona colony.
Climate
Tel Aviv has a Mediterranean climate
A Mediterranean climate ( ), also called a dry summer climate, described by Köppen and Trewartha as ''Cs'', is a temperate climate type that occurs in the lower mid-latitudes (normally 30 to 44 north and south latitude). Such climates typic ...
(Köppen climate classification
The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...
: Csa), and enjoys plenty of sunshine throughout the year. Most precipitation falls in the form of rain between the months of October and April, with intervening dry summers, and there is almost no rainfall from June to September. The average annual temperature is , and the average sea temperature is during the winter, and during the summer. The city averages of precipitation annually.
Summers in Tel Aviv last about five months, from June to October. August, the warmest month, averages a high of , and a low of . The high relative humidity due to the location of the city by the Mediterranean Sea, in a combination with the high temperatures, creates a thermal discomfort during the summer. Summer low temperatures in Tel Aviv seldom drop below .
Winters are mild and wet, with most of the annual precipitation falling within the months of December, January and February as intense rainfall and thunderstorms. In January, the coolest month, the average maximum temperature is , the minimum temperature averages . During the coldest days of winter, temperatures may vary between and . Both freezing temperatures and snowfall are extremely rare in the city.
Autumns and springs are characterized by sharp temperature changes, with heat waves that might be created due to hot and dry air masses that arrive from the nearby deserts. During heatwaves in autumn and springs, temperatures usually climb up to and even up to , accompanied with exceptionally low humidity. An average day during autumn and spring has a high of to , and a low of to .
The highest recorded temperature in Tel Aviv was on 17 May 1916, and the lowest is on 7 February 1950, during a cold wave that brought the only recorded snowfall in Tel Aviv.
Government
Tel Aviv is governed by a 31-member city council elected for a five-year term by in direct proportional elections, and a mayor elected for the same term by direct elections under a two-round system
The two-round system (TRS or 2RS), sometimes called ballotage, top-two runoff, or two-round plurality, is a single-winner electoral system which aims to elect a member who has support of the majority of voters. The two-round system involves one ...
. Like all other mayors in Israel, no term limits
A term limit is a legal restriction on the number of Term of office, terms a Incumbent, person may serve in a particular elected office. When term limits are found in Presidential system, presidential and Semi-presidential republic, semi-president ...
exist for the Mayor of Tel Aviv. All Israeli citizens over the age of 17 with at least one year of residence in Tel Aviv are eligible to vote in municipal elections. The municipality is responsible for social services, community programs, public infrastructure, urban planning, tourism and other local affairs. The Tel Aviv City Hall is located at Rabin Square
Rabin Square (), formerly Kings of Israel Square (), is a main large public city square in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel. Over the years it has been the site of numerous political rallies, parades, and other public events. In 1995, the square ...
. Ron Huldai
Ron Huldai (; born 26 August 1944) is an Israeli politician and businessman who has been Mayor of Tel Aviv since 1998. Before taking office as mayor, Huldai served as a fighter pilot and commander in the Israeli Air Force. After leaving the ...
has been mayor of Tel Aviv since 1998. Huldai was reelected to a sixth term in the 2024 municipal elections, defeating former Minister of Economy
A ministry of finance is a ministry or other government agency in charge of government finance, fiscal policy, and financial regulation. It is headed by a finance minister, an executive or cabinet position .
A ministry of finance's portfolio ...
Orna Barbivai
Orna Barbivai (; born 5 September 1962) is the former Minister of Economy, a retired major general in the Israel Defense Forces, and the former head of its Manpower Directorate. She was the first woman to be made Major-general (Aluf), the I ...
. Huldai has become city's longest-serving mayor, surpassing Shlomo Lahat
Shlomo "Chich" Lahat (; November 9, 1927 – October 1, 2014) was a major general in the Israel Defense Forces and former Head of the Manpower Directorate. He served as the eighth mayor of Tel Aviv in 1974–1993, for four consecutive terms. Afte ...
's 19-year term. The shortest-serving mayor was David Bloch, who served a two year term between 1925 and 1927.
Politically, Tel Aviv is known to be a stronghold for the left, in both local and national issues. The left wing vote is especially prevalent in the city's mostly affluent central and northern neighborhoods, though not the case for its working-class southeastern neighborhoods which tend to vote for right wing parties in national elections. Outside the kibbutz
A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...
im, Meretz
Meretz (, ; ) was a left-wing political party in Israel. The party was formed in 1992 by the merger of Ratz, Mapam and Shinui, and was at its peak between 1992 and 1996 when it had 12 seats. It had no seats in the Knesset following its failure ...
receives more votes in Tel Aviv than in any other city in Israel.
Demographics
Tel Aviv has a population of 495,600[ spread over a land area of . According to the ]Israel Central Bureau of Statistics
The Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (, ''HaLishka HaMerkazit LiStatistika''; ), abbreviated CBS, is an Israeli government office established in 1949 to carry out research and publish statistical data on all aspects of Israeli life, including ...
(CBS), Tel Aviv's population was growing at an annual rate of 0.5 percent. Jews of all backgrounds formed 91.8 percent of the population, Muslims and Arab Christians
Arab Christians () are the Arabs who adhere to Christianity. The number of Arab Christians who live in the Middle East was estimated in 2012 to be between 10 and 15 million. Arab Christian communities can be found throughout the Arab world, bu ...
made up 4.2 percent, and the remainder belonged to other groups (including various Christian and Asian communities). As Tel Aviv is a multicultural city, many languages are spoken in addition to Hebrew
Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...
. According to some estimates, about 50,000 unregistered African and Asian foreign worker
Foreign workers or guest workers are people who work in a country other than one of which they are a citizen. Some foreign workers use a guest worker program in a country with more preferred job prospects than in their home country. Guest worke ...
s live in the city. Compared with Westernised cities, crime in Tel Aviv is relatively low.
According to Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality, the average income in the city, which had an unemployment
Unemployment, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is the proportion of people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work du ...
rate of 4.6% in 2014, is 20% above the national average. The city's education standards are above the national average: of its 12th-grade students, 64.4 percent are eligible for matriculation certificates. The age profile is relatively even, with 22.2 percent aged under 20, 18.5 percent aged 20–29, 24 percent aged 30–44, 16.2 percent aged between 45 and 59, and 19.1 percent older than 60.
Tel Aviv's population reached a peak in the early 1960s at around 390,000, falling to 317,000 in the late 1980s as high property prices forced families out and deterred young couples from moving in. Since the 1990s, population has steadily grown. Today, the city's population is young and growing. In 2006, 22,000 people moved to the city, while only 18,500 left, and many of the new families had young children. Meanwhile, the average age of residents fell from 35.8 in 1983 to 34 in 2008. The population over age 65 stands at 14.6 percent compared with 19% in 1983. The population is expected to reach 535,000 in 2030. Under a master plan for the city approved by the Tel Aviv District Planning and Building Committee in 2025, the city's population will grow to 600,000 by 2035.[
]
Religion
Tel Aviv has 544 active synagogues, including historic buildings such as the Great Synagogue, established in the 1930s. In 2008, a center for secular Jewish studies
Jewish studies (or Judaic studies; ) is an academic discipline centered on the study of Jews and Judaism. Jewish studies is interdisciplinary and combines aspects of history (especially Jewish history), Middle Eastern studies, Asian studies, ...
and a secular yeshiva opened in the city. Tensions between religious and secular Jews
Secular Jew may refer to:
* A general epithet for Jews who participate in modern secular society and are not stringently religious
* Nonreligious Jews:
** Jewish atheism
** List of Jewish atheists and agnostics
* ''Hiloni'' ("secular") a social ca ...
before the 2006 gay pride parade ended in vandalism of a synagogue. The number of churches has grown to accommodate the religious needs of diplomats and foreign workers. In 2019, the population was 89.9% Jewish, and 4.5% Arab; among Arabs, 82.8% were Muslim, 16.4% were Christian, and 0.8% were Druze
The Druze ( ; , ' or ', , '), who Endonym and exonym, call themselves al-Muwaḥḥidūn (), are an Arabs, Arab Eastern esotericism, esoteric Religious denomination, religious group from West Asia who adhere to the Druze faith, an Abrahamic ...
. The remaining 5 percent were not classified by religion. Israel Meir Lau is Chief Rabbi
Chief Rabbi () is a title given in several countries to the recognized religious leader of that country's Jewish community, or to a rabbinic leader appointed by the local secular authorities. Since 1911, through a capitulation by Ben-Zion Meir ...
of the city.
Tel Aviv is an ethnically diverse city. The Jewish population, which forms the majority group in Tel Aviv, consists of the descendants of immigrants from all parts of the world, including Ashkenazi Jews
Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium CE. They traditionally speak Yiddish, a language ...
from Europe, North America, South America, Australia and South Africa, as well as Sephardic
Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsular Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and their descendant ...
and Mizrahi Jews
Mizrahi Jews (), also known as ''Mizrahim'' () in plural and ''Mizrahi'' () in singular, and alternatively referred to as Oriental Jews or ''Edot HaMizrach'' (, ), are terms used in Israeli discourse to refer to a grouping of Jews, Jewish c ...
from Southern Europe, North Africa, India, Central Asia, West Asia, and the Arabian Peninsula. There are also a sizable number of Ethiopian Jews
Beta Israel, or Ethiopian Jews, is a Jewish group originating from the territory of the Amhara and Tigray regions in northern Ethiopia, where they are spread out across more than 500 small villages over a wide territory, alongside predominant ...
and their descendants living in Tel Aviv. In addition to Muslim and Arab Christian
Arab Christians () are the Arabs who adhere to Christianity. The number of Arab Christians who live in the Middle East was estimated in 2012 to be between 10 and 15 million. Arab Christian communities can be found throughout the Arab world, bu ...
minorities in the city, several hundred Armenian
Armenian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent
** Armenian diaspora, Armenian communities around the ...
Christians reside in the city, concentrated mainly in Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
. There are also some Christians from the former Soviet Union who immigrated to Israel with Jewish spouses and relatives. In recent years, Tel Aviv has received many non-Jewish migrants from Asia and Africa, students, foreign workers (documented and undocumented) and refugees. There are many economic migrants and refugees from African countries, primarily Eritrea
Eritrea, officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa, with its capital and largest city being Asmara. It is bordered by Ethiopia in the Eritrea–Ethiopia border, south, Sudan in the west, and Dj ...
and Sudan
Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Libya to the northwest, Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the east, Eritrea and Ethiopi ...
, located in the southern part of the city.
Neighborhoods
Tel Aviv is divided into nine boroughs that have formed naturally over the city's short history. The oldest of these is Jaffa, the ancient port city
A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Hamburg, Manche ...
out of which Tel Aviv grew. This area is traditionally made up demographically of a greater percentage of Arabs, but recent gentrification
Gentrification is the process whereby the character of a neighborhood changes through the influx of more Wealth, affluent residents (the "gentry") and investment. There is no agreed-upon definition of gentrification. In public discourse, it has ...
is replacing them with a young professional and artist population. Similar processes are occurring in nearby Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
, the original Jewish neighborhood outside of Jaffa. Ramat Aviv
Ramat Aviv Alef or Ramat Aviv HaYeruka, and originally plainly Ramat Aviv (, ''lit.'' Spring Heights), is a neighborhood in northwest Tel Aviv, Israel.
History
Ramat Aviv was founded in 1950s following the great influx of immigrants from Eastern ...
, a district in the northern part of the city that is largely made up of luxury apartments and includes Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University (TAU) is a Public university, public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and ...
, is currently undergoing extensive expansion and is set to absorb the beachfront property of Sde Dov Airport after its decommissioning. The area known as HaKirya
HaKirya, or The Kirya (, ), is an area in central Tel Aviv, consisting of an urban military base north of Kaplan Street.
HaKirya contains the Tel Aviv District's government center and the major Israel Defense Forces (IDF) base Camp Rabin (, ''Mah ...
is the Israel Defense Forces
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...
(IDF) headquarters and a large military base
A military base is a facility directly owned and operated by or for the military or one of its branches that shelters military equipment and personnel, and facilitates training and operations. A military base always provides accommodations for ...
.[ Moreover, in the past few years, ]Rothschild Boulevard
Rothschild Boulevard (, ''Sderot Rotshild'') is one of the principal streets in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel, beginning in Neve Tzedek at its southwestern edge and running north to Habima Theatre. It is one of the most expensive streets in the ...
which is beginning in Neve Tzedek has become an attraction for tourists, businesses and startups. It features a wide, tree-lined central strip with pedestrian and bike lanes. Historically, there was a demographic split between the Ashkenazi
Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that Ethnogenesis, emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium Common era, CE. They traditionally spe ...
northern side of the city, including the district of Ramat Aviv, and the southern, more Sephardi
Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsular Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and their descendant ...
and Mizrahi
''Mizrachi'' or ''Mizrahi'' () has two meanings.
In the literal Hebrew meaning ''eastern'', it may refer to:
* Mizrahi Jews, Jews from the Middle East and North Africa
* Mizrahi (surname), a Sephardic surname, given to Jews who got to the Iberia ...
neighborhoods including Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
and Florentin
Florentin or Florentín (from Latin ''Florentinus'') can be a given name or surname. It is found as a given name among Romanian language, Romanian, German language, German, French language, French and Spanish language, Spanish speakers. The latter ...
.
Since the 1980s, major restoration and gentrification projects have been implemented in southern Tel Aviv. Baruch Yoscovitz, city planner for Tel Aviv beginning in 2001, reworked old British plans for the Florentin neighborhood from the 1920s, adding green areas, pedestrian malls, and housing. The municipality invested two million shekels in the project. The goal was to make Florentin the Soho
SoHo, short for "South of Houston Street, Houston Street", is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Since the 1970s, the neighborhood has been the location of many artists' lofts and art galleries, art installations such as The Wall ...
of Tel Aviv, and attract artists and young professionals to the neighborhood. Street artists, such as Dede, installation artists such as Sigalit Landau
Sigalit Landau (; born 1969) is an Israeli multi-disciplinary artist known for her work in drawing, sculpture, video and performance art, video and installation art. Her works are featured in a number of institutions, including the Museum of Mo ...
, and many others made the upbeat neighborhood their home base. Florentin is now known as a hip, "cool" place to be in Tel Aviv with coffeehouses, markets, bars, galleries and parties.
Health
Tel Aviv is home to Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center
Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center (), commonly referred to as Ichilov Hospital () is the largest teaching hospital and general hospital serving Tel Aviv, Israel and its metropolitan area and is the second-largest hospital complex in the country. T ...
, the third-largest hospital complex in Israel. It contains Ichilov Hospital, the Ida Sourasky Rehabilitation Center, Lis Maternity and Women's Hospital, and Dana-Dwek Children's Hospital. The city also contains Assuta Medical Center
Assuta Medical Center () is a private medical center (and company) in the Ramat HaHayal neighborhood in north Tel Aviv, Israel established in 1936. The hospital performs surgery and diagnostic procedures in all fields of medicine, including cardio ...
, a private hospital which offers surgical and diagnostic services in all fields of medicine and has an IVF
In vitro fertilisation (IVF) is a process of fertilisation in which an egg is combined with sperm in vitro ("in glass"). The process involves monitoring and stimulating the ovulatory process, then removing an ovum or ova (egg or eggs) from t ...
clinic.
Education
In 2006, 51,359 children attended school in Tel Aviv, of whom 8,977 were in municipal kindergartens, 23,573 in municipal elementary schools, and 18,809 in high schools. Sixty-four percent of students in the city are entitled to matriculation, more than 5 percent higher than the national average. About 4,000 children are in first grade at schools in the city, and population growth is expected to raise this number to 6,000. As a result, 20 additional kindergarten classes were opened in 2008–09 in the city. A new elementary school is planned north of Sde Dov as well as a new high school in northern Tel Aviv.
The first Hebrew high school, called Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium
The Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium (, also known as ''Gymnasia Herzliya''), originally known as HaGymnasia HaIvrit (lit. Hebrew High School) is a historic high school in Tel Aviv, Israel, whose faculty and alumni includes many people influential in t ...
, was established in Jaffa in 1905 and moved to Tel Aviv after its founding in 1909, where a new campus on Herzl Street was constructed for it.
Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University (TAU) is a Public university, public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and ...
, the largest university in Israel, is known internationally for its physics
Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...
, computer science
Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...
, chemistry
Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...
and linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...
departments. Together with Bar-Ilan University
Bar-Ilan University (BIU, , ''Universitat Bar-Ilan'') is a public research university in the Tel Aviv District city of Ramat Gan, Israel. Established in 1955, Bar Ilan is Israel's second-largest academic university institution. It has 20,000 ...
in neighboring Ramat Gan
Ramat Gan (, ) is a city in the Tel Aviv District of Israel, located east of the municipality of Tel Aviv, and is part of the Gush Dan, Gush Dan metropolitan area. It is home to a Diamond Exchange District (one of the world's major diamond exch ...
, the student population numbers over 50,000, including a sizeable international community
The international community is a term used in geopolitics and international relations to refer to a broad group of people and governments of the world.
Usage
Aside from its use as a general descriptor, the term is typically used to imply the ...
. Its campus is located in the neighborhood of Ramat Aviv
Ramat Aviv Alef or Ramat Aviv HaYeruka, and originally plainly Ramat Aviv (, ''lit.'' Spring Heights), is a neighborhood in northwest Tel Aviv, Israel.
History
Ramat Aviv was founded in 1950s following the great influx of immigrants from Eastern ...
. Tel Aviv also has several colleges.
The Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium
The Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium (, also known as ''Gymnasia Herzliya''), originally known as HaGymnasia HaIvrit (lit. Hebrew High School) is a historic high school in Tel Aviv, Israel, whose faculty and alumni includes many people influential in t ...
moved from Jaffa to old Tel Aviv in 1909 and moved to Jabotinsky Zhabotinsky or Jabotinsky (Ukrainian: Жаботинський) is a masculine Ukrainian toponymic surname referring to the village of Zhabotin. Its feminine counterpart is Zhabotinskaya, Jabotinskaya, Zhabotinska or Jabotinska. Notable people with ...
Street in the early 1960s. Other notable schools in Tel Aviv include Shevah Mofet
Shevah Mofet (; ), also transliterated Shevach Moffet, is a junior and high school on HaMasger Street in Tel Aviv, Israel. It was established in 1942 as a vocational school. Since the 1990s, new programs were inaugurated to meet the needs of the Ru ...
, the second Hebrew school
Hebrew school is Jewish education focusing on topics of Jewish history, learning the Hebrew language, and finally learning one's Torah Portion, in preparation for the ceremony in Judaism of entering adulthood, known as a Bar or Bat Mitzvah. Heb ...
in the city, Ironi Alef High School for Arts and Alliance
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or sovereign state, states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not an explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an a ...
.
Economy
Tel Aviv has been ranked as the twenty-fifth most important financial center in the world. In 1926, the country's first shopping arcade, Passage Pensak, was built there. By 1936, as tens of thousands of middle class immigrants
Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not usual residents or where they do not possess nationality in order to settle as permanent residents. Commuters, tourists, and other short- ...
arrived from Europe, Tel Aviv was already the largest city in Palestine. A small port was built at the Yarkon estuary, and many cafes, clubs and cinemas opened. Herzl Street became a commercial thoroughfare at this time.
Economic activities account for 17 percent of the GDP. In 2011, Tel Aviv had an unemployment rate of 4.4 percent. The city has been described as a "flourishing technological center" by ''Newsweek
''Newsweek'' is an American weekly news magazine based in New York City. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely distributed during the 20th century and has had many notable editors-in-chief. It is currently co-owned by Dev P ...
'' and a "miniature Los Angeles" by ''The Economist
''The Economist'' is a British newspaper published weekly in printed magazine format and daily on Electronic publishing, digital platforms. It publishes stories on topics that include economics, business, geopolitics, technology and culture. M ...
''.[ ] In 1998, the city was described by Newsweek as one of the 10 most technologically influential cities in the world. Since then, high-tech industry in the Tel Aviv area has continued to develop. The Tel Aviv metropolitan area (including satellite cities
A satellite city or satellite town is a smaller municipality or settlement that is part of (or on the edge of) a larger metropolitan area and serves as a regional population and employment center. It differs from mere suburbs, subdivisions a ...
such as Herzliya
Herzliya ( ; , / ) is an affluent List of Israeli cities, city in the Israeli coastal plain, central coast of Israel, at the northern part of the Tel Aviv District, known for its robust start-up and entrepreneurial culture. In it had a populatio ...
and Petah Tikva
Petah Tikva (, ), also spelt Petah Tiqwa and known informally as Em HaMoshavot (), is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, east of Tel Aviv. It was founded in 1878, mainly by Haredi Judaism, Haredi Jews of the Old Y ...
) is Israel's center of high-tech, sometimes referred to as Silicon Wadi
Silicon Wadi (, ) is a region in Israel that serves as one of the global centres for High tech, advanced technology. It spans the Israeli coastal plain, and is cited as among the reasons why, for some, the country has become known as the world ...
.
In 2016, the Globalization and World Cities Study Group and Network (GaWC) at Loughborough University
Loughborough University (abbreviated as ''Lough'' or ''Lboro'' for Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a public university, public research university in the market town of Loughborough, Leicestershire, England. It has been a university sinc ...
reissued an inventory of world cities
A global city (also known as a power city, world city, alpha city, or world center) is a city that serves as a primary node in the global economic network. The concept originates from geography and urban studies, based on the thesis that glo ...
based on their level of advanced producer services. Tel Aviv was ranked as an alpha- world city.
The Kiryat Atidim
Kiryat Atidim () is a high tech district of Tel Aviv, Israel. History
Kiryat Atidim is located in North East of Tel Aviv near the Petah Tikva industrial zone. The zone was opened in 1972 as a project of Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv Univers ...
high tech
High technology (high tech or high-tech), also known as advanced technology (advanced tech) or exotechnology, is technology that is at the state of the art, cutting edge: the highest form of technology available. It can be defined as either the ...
zone opened in 1972 and the city has become a major world high tech hub. In December 2012, the city was ranked second on a list of top places to found a high tech startup company
A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an Entrepreneurship, entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship includes all new businesses including self-employment and businesses tha ...
, just behind Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...
. In 2013, Tel Aviv had more than 700 startup companies and research and development centers, and was ranked the second-most innovative city in the world, behind Medellín
Medellín ( ; or ), officially the Special District of Science, Technology and Innovation of Medellín (), is the List of cities in Colombia, second-largest city in Colombia after Bogotá, and the capital of the department of Antioquia Departme ...
and ahead of New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
.
According to Forbes
''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The co ...
, nine of its fifteen Israeli-born billionaires live in Israel; four live in Tel Aviv and its suburbs. The cost of living
The cost of living is the cost of maintaining a certain standard of living for an individual or a household. Changes in the cost of living over time can be measured in a cost-of-living index. Cost of living calculations are also used to compare t ...
in Israel is high, with Tel Aviv being its most expensive city to live in. In 2021, Tel Aviv became the world's most expensive city to live in, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) is the research and analysis division of the Economist Group, providing forecasting and advisory services through research and analysis, such as monthly country reports, five-year country economic forecasts ...
.
Shopping malls in Tel Aviv include Dizengoff Center, Ramat Aviv Mall
Ramat Aviv Mall (Hebrew: ) is an upscale shopping mall at 40 Einstein Street, in Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv, Israel. At a rent of $1,804 per square meter, it is Israel's most expensive mall and the 35th most expensive mall in the world. It houses many ...
and Azrieli Shopping Mall and markets such as Carmel Market, Ha'Tikva Market, and Bezalel Market.
Tel Aviv is home to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE; ), colloquially known as The Bursa, is the only public stock exchange in Israel and a public company itself, listed on its own exchange since August 1, 2019. It is regulated by the ''Securities Law (1968)'' a ...
(TASE), Israel's only stock exchange
A stock exchange, securities exchange, or bourse is an exchange where stockbrokers and traders can buy and sell securities, such as shares of stock, bonds and other financial instruments. Stock exchanges may also provide facilities for ...
, which has reached record heights since the 1990s. The Tel Aviv Stock exchange has also gained attention for its resilience and ability to recover from war and disasters. For example, the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange was higher on the last day of both the 2006 Lebanon war and the 2009 Operation in Gaza than on the first day of fighting. Many international venture-capital firms, scientific research
The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has been referred to while doing science since at least the 17th century. Historically, it was developed through the centuries from the ancient and medieval world. The ...
institutes and high-tech companies are headquartered in the city. Industries in Tel Aviv include chemical processing, textile plants and food manufacturers.
Tel Aviv is ranked the 4th top global startup ecosystem hub according to the startup genome.
Tourism and recreation
Tel Aviv receives about 2.5 million international visitors annually, the fifth-most-visited city in the Middle East & Africa. In 2010, ''Knight Frank
Knight Frank LLP is a global real estate consultancy and estate agency headquartered in London, England.
Knight Frank's global network has more than 488 offices across 57 territories and more than 20,000 people managing commercial, agricultur ...
''s world city survey ranked it 34th globally. Tel Aviv has been named the third "hottest city for 2011" (behind only New York City and Tangier) by ''Lonely Planet
Lonely Planet is a travel guide book publisher. Founded in Australia in 1973, the company has printed over 150 million books.
History
20th century
Lonely Planet was founded by married couple Maureen Wheeler, Maureen and Tony Wheeler. In 19 ...
'', third-best in the Middle East and Africa by ''Travel + Leisure magazine'' (behind only Cape Town and Jerusalem), and the ninth-best beach city in the world by ''National Geographic
''National Geographic'' (formerly ''The National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as ''Nat Geo'') is an American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine ...
''. Tel Aviv is consistently ranked as one of the top LGBT
LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, asexual, aromantic, agender, and other individuals. The gro ...
destinations in the world. The city has also been ranked as one of the top 10 oceanfront cities.
Tel Aviv is known as "the city that never sleeps" and a "party capital" due to its thriving nightlife
Nightlife is a collective term for entertainment that is available and generally more popular from the late evening into the early hours of the morning. It includes pubs, bars, nightclubs, parties, live music, concerts, cabarets, theatre, ...
, young atmosphere and famous 24-hour culture. Tel Aviv has branches of some of the world's leading hotels, including the Crowne Plaza
Crowne Plaza by IHG is a multinational chain of full service, upscale hotels headquartered in the United Kingdom. It caters to the business, leisure and blended travel market usually located in city centers, resorts, coastal towns or near major a ...
, Sheraton, Dan
Dan or DAN may refer to:
People
* Dan (name), including a list of people with the name
** Dan (king), several kings of Denmark
* Dan people, an ethnic group located in West Africa
** Dan language, a Mande language spoken primarily in Côte d'Ivo ...
, Isrotel
Isrotel Ltd. is an Israeli hotel chain headquartered in Tel Aviv. It operates 21 hotels and resorts throughout the country, most of which are located in and around Eilat
Eilat ( , ; ; ) is Israel's southernmost city, with a population of ...
and Hilton. It is home to many museums, architectural and cultural sites, with city tours available in different languages. Apart from bus tours, architectural tours, Segway
A Segway is a two-wheeled, self-balancing personal transporter device invented by Dean Kamen. The name is a registered trademark of Segway Inc. It was brought to market in 2001 as the Segway HT, and then subsequently as the Segway PT. ''HT ...
tours, and walking tours are also popular. Tel Aviv has 44 hotels with more than 6,500 rooms.
The beaches of Tel Aviv and the city's promenade
An esplanade or promenade is a long, open, level area, usually next to a river or large body of water, where people may walk. The historical definition of ''esplanade'' was a large, open, level area outside fortification, fortress or city walls ...
play a major role in the city's cultural and touristic scene, often ranked as some of the best beaches in the world. Yarkon Park
Yarkon Park (, ''Park HaYarkon'') is a park in Tel Aviv, Israel, with about sixteen million visits annually. Named after the Yarkon River, which flows through it, the park includes extensive lawns, sports facilities, botanical gardens, an aviar ...
is the most visited urban park
An urban park or metropolitan park, also known as a city park, municipal park (North America), public park, public open space, or municipal gardens (United Kingdom, UK), is a park or botanical garden in cities, densely populated suburbia and oth ...
in Israel, with 16 million visitors annually. Other parks within city limits include Charles Clore Park
Charles Clore Park (, ''Park Charles Clore'') is a beachfront park in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. Covering of public land along the Mediterranean Sea, it's named after Charles Clore, a British financier, property magnate and philanthropist. T ...
, Independence Park, Meir Park and Dubnow Garden. About 19% of the city land consists of green spaces.
Culture
Architecture
Tel Aviv is home to different architectural style
An architectural style is a classification of buildings (and nonbuilding structures) based on a set of characteristics and features, including overall appearance, arrangement of the components, method of construction, building materials used, for ...
s that represent influential periods in its history. The early architecture of Tel Aviv consisted largely of European-style single-storey houses with red-tiled roofs. Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
, the first neighbourhood to be built outside of Jaffa, is characterised by two-storey sandstone buildings.[ By the 1920s, a new eclectic Orientalist style came into vogue, combining European architecture with Eastern features such as arches, domes and ornamental tiles.][ Pagoda House (''Beit HaPagoda''), designed by Alexander Levy and built in 1924, is an example of this style.][Tel Aviv Municipality: History](_blank)
Municipal construction followed the " garden city" master plan drawn up by Patrick Geddes
Sir Patrick Geddes (2 October 1854 – 17 April 1932) was a Scottish biologist, sociologist, Comtean positivist, geographer, philanthropist and pioneering town planner. He is known for his innovative thinking in the fields of urban plannin ...
. Two- and three-storey buildings were interspersed with boulevards and public parks.[ Various architectural styles, such as ]Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French (), is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design that first Art Deco in Paris, appeared in Paris in the 1910s just before World War I and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920 ...
, classical and modernist also exist in Tel Aviv.
Bauhaus architecture was introduced in the 1920s and 1930s by German Jewish architects who settled in Palestine after the rise of the Nazis. Tel Aviv's White City, around the city center, contains more than 5,000 Modernist-style buildings inspired by the Bauhaus school
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the , was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., 2009), , pp. 64� ...
and Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , ; ), was a Swiss-French architectural designer, painter, urban planner and writer, who was one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture ...
.[ Construction of these buildings, later declared protected landmarks and, collectively, a ]UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...
World Heritage Site
World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...
, continued until the 1950s in the area around Rothschild Boulevard
Rothschild Boulevard (, ''Sderot Rotshild'') is one of the principal streets in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel, beginning in Neve Tzedek at its southwestern edge and running north to Habima Theatre. It is one of the most expensive streets in the ...
.[ Some 3,000 buildings were created in this style between 1931 and 1939 alone.] In the 1960s, this architectural style gave way to office towers and a chain of waterfront hotels and commercial skyscrapers. Some of the city's Modernist buildings were neglected to the point of ruin. Before legislation to preserve this landmark architecture, many of the old buildings were demolished. Efforts are under way to refurbish Bauhaus buildings and restore them to their original condition.
The Shalom Meir Tower
Shalom Meir Tower (, ''Migdal Shalom Meir''; commonly known as Migdal Shalom, ) is an office tower in Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first skyscraper built in Israel.
Overview
Shalom Meir Tower was designed by architects Yitzhak Pearlstein, Gideon ...
, Israel's first skyscraper, was built in Tel Aviv in 1965 and remained the country's tallest building until 1999. At the time of its construction, the building rivaled Europe's tallest buildings in height, and was the tallest in the Middle East.
In the mid-1990s, the construction of skyscrapers began throughout the entire city, altering its skyline. Before that, Tel Aviv had had a generally low-rise skyline. In 2010, the Tel Aviv Municipality's Planning and Construction Committee launched a new master plan for the city for 2025. It decided not to allow the construction of any additional skyscrapers in the city center, while at the same time greatly increasing the construction of skyscrapers in the east. The ban extends to an area between the coast and Ibn Gabirol Street
Ibn Gabirol Street () (colloquially Ibn Gvirol or Even Gvirol) is a major street in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Ibn Gabirol Street is named after the medieval Hebrew poet and philosopher Solomon ibn Gabirol. It carries traffic north and south, and is a bus ...
, and also between the Yarkon River
The Yarkon River, also Yarqon River or Jarkon River (, ''Nahal HaYarkon''; , ''Nahr al-Auja''), is a river in central Israel. The source of the Yarkon ("Greenish" in Hebrew) is at Tel Afek (Antipatris), north of Petah Tikva. It flows west throu ...
and Eilat Street. It did not extend to towers already under construction or approved. One final proposed skyscraper project was approved, while dozens of others had to be scrapped. Any new buildings there will usually not be allowed to rise above six and a half stories. However, hotel towers along almost the entire beachfront will be allowed to rise up to 25 stories. According to the plan, large numbers of skyscrapers and high-rise buildings at least 18 stories tall would be built in the entire area between Ibn Gabirol Street and the eastern city limits, as part of the master plan's goal of doubling the city's office space to cement Tel Aviv as the business capital of Israel. Under the plan, "forests" of corporate skyscrapers will line both sides of the Ayalon Highway Ayalon (, ‘place of deer’) is an Israel
Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west ...
. Further south, skyscrapers rising up to 40 stories will be built along the old Ottoman railway between Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
and Florentin, Tel Aviv, Florentine, with the first such tower there being the Neve Tzedek Tower. Along nearby Shlavim Street, passing between Jaffa and south Tel Aviv, office buildings up to 25 stories will line both sides of the street, which will be widened to accommodate traffic from the city's southern entrance to the center.
Arts and museums
In the 1920s Tel-Aviv gradually became the center of art in Israel. In 1919, several prominent Olim from Odesa, Odessa arrived in the Ruslan (ship), Ruslan ship. In 1920 some of these set up the Ha-Tomer, HaTomer art cooperative as well as opened the first modern art exhibition in Israel. In the 1925 following the return of Yitzhak Frenkel, Isaac Frenkel Frenel from Paris and his opening of the Histadrut Art Studio, Histadrut art studio, and the introduction of School of Paris, École de Paris influence; Tel Aviv grew to supplement Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
in its cultural importance in the visual arts; especially in respect to modern art. In the late 1920s to 1940s Tel Aviv painters were heavily influenced by the School of Paris, École de Paris, painting Tel Aviv's urban landscape, people and cafes in a manner influenced by Chaïm Soutine, Soutine, Jules Pascin, Pascin, Yitzhak Frenkel, Frenel, Marc Chagall, Chagall and others from the School of Paris. Tel Aviv's bohemian culture was characterized by cafes such as Café Kassit, Kassit which attracted numerous writers and painters. Numerous exhibitions were held in the Ohel Theater, Ohel theatre and the Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium
The Herzliya Hebrew Gymnasium (, also known as ''Gymnasia Herzliya''), originally known as HaGymnasia HaIvrit (lit. Hebrew High School) is a historic high school in Tel Aviv, Israel, whose faculty and alumni includes many people influential in t ...
prior to the opening of museums. Reuven Rubin, Reuben Rubin and Nachum Gutman, Nahum Gutman also worked and painted in the city, painting in the naive style. Tel Aviv hosts the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv museum of art, established in 1932 in Meir Dizengoff
Meir Dizengoff (; born Meer Yankelevich Dizengof, ); 25 February 1861 – 23 September 1936) was a Zionism, Zionist leader and politician and the founder and first Mayor of Tel Aviv, mayor of Tel Aviv (1911–1922 as head of town planning, 1922� ...
's house, since having moved to a new larger location in 1971, as well as numerous galleries.
Israel has the highest number of museums per capita of any country, with three of the largest located in Tel Aviv. Among these are the Eretz Israel Museum
The Eretz Israel Museum (also known as Muza) is a historical and archaeological museum in the Ramat Aviv neighborhood of Tel Aviv, Israel.
Eretz Israel Museum, established in 1953, has a large display of archaeological, anthropological and h ...
, known for its collection of archaeology and history exhibits dealing with the Land of Israel, and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. In 2023, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art was ranked 48th on ''The Art Newspaper, The Art Magazine''s list of the 100 most popular museums in the world. Housed on the campus of Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv University (TAU) is a Public university, public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and ...
is ANU - Museum of the Jewish People, a museum of the international Jewish diaspora that tells the story of Jewish prosperity and persecution throughout the Jewish diaspora, centuries of exile. Batey Haosef Museum specializes in Israel Defense Forces
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...
military history. The Palmach Museum near Tel Aviv University offers a multimedia experience of the history of the Palmach. Right next to Charles Clore Park
Charles Clore Park (, ''Park Charles Clore'') is a beachfront park in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. Covering of public land along the Mediterranean Sea, it's named after Charles Clore, a British financier, property magnate and philanthropist. T ...
is a museum of the Irgun
The Irgun (), officially the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel, often abbreviated as Etzel or IZL (), was a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of th ...
. The Israel Trade Fairs & Convention Center, located in the northern part of the city, hosts more than 60 major events annually. Many offbeat museums and galleries operate in the southern areas, including the Tel Aviv Raw Art contemporary art gallery.
Entertainment and performing arts
Tel Aviv is a major center of culture and entertainment. Eighteen of Israel's 35 major centers for the performing arts are located in the city, including five of the country's nine large theatres, where 55% of all performances in the country and 75 percent of all attendance occurs. The Tel Aviv Performing Arts Center is home of the Israeli Opera, where Plácido Domingo was house tenor between 1962 and 1965, and the Cameri Theater, Cameri Theatre. With 2,482 seats, the Heichal HaTarbut is the city's largest theatre and home to the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.
Habima Theatre
The Habima Theatre ( ''Te'atron HaBima'', lit. "The Stage Theatre") is the List of national theatres, national theatre of Israel and one of the first Hebrew language theatres. It is located in Habima Square in the center of Tel Aviv.
History
...
, Israel's national theatre, was closed down for renovations in early 2008, and reopened in November 2011 after major remodeling. Enav Cultural Center is one of the newer additions to the cultural scene. Other theatres in Tel Aviv are the Gesher Theatre and Beit Lessin Theater; Tzavta and Tmuna are smaller theatres that host performance, musical performances and fringe theatre, fringe productions. In Jaffa, the Simta and Notzar theatres specialize in fringe as well. Tel Aviv is home to the Batsheva Dance Company, a world-famous contemporary dance troupe. The Israeli Ballet is also based in Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv's center for modern and classical dance is the Suzanne Dellal Center for Dance and Theater, Suzanne Dellal Center for Dance and Theatre in Neve Tzedek
Neve Tzedek (, ''lit.'' Abode of Justice) is a Jewish neighborhood in southwestern Tel Aviv, Israel. It was the first Judaism, Jewish neighborhood to be built outside the old city of the ancient port of Jaffa. It was founded by a group of 48 J ...
.
The city often hosts international musicians at venues such as Yarkon Park
Yarkon Park (, ''Park HaYarkon'') is a park in Tel Aviv, Israel, with about sixteen million visits annually. Named after the Yarkon River, which flows through it, the park includes extensive lawns, sports facilities, botanical gardens, an aviar ...
, Expo Tel Aviv, the Barby Club, the Zappa Club and Live Park Rishon Lezion just south of Tel Aviv. The Eurovision Song Contest 2019 was held at Expo Tel Aviv (the first Israeli-hosted Eurovision held outside of Jerusalem), following Israel's win the year prior. Opera and classical music performances are held daily in Tel Aviv, with many of the world's leading conducting, classical conductors and solo (music), soloists performing on Tel Aviv stages over the years.
The Tel Aviv Cinematheque
Tel Aviv Cinematheque (also called: Doron Cinema center) is a cinematheque and movie archive, opened in Tel Aviv on 12 May 1973.
The Cinematheque, located at HaArba'a Street 5, has five screening halls. The Cinematheque programming includes Is ...
screens art movies, premieres of short and full-length Israeli films, and hosts a variety of film festivals, among them the Festival of Animation, Comics and Caricatures, "Icon" Science Fiction and Fantasy Festival, the Student Film Festival, the Jazz, Film and Videotape Festival and Salute to Israeli Cinema. The city has several multiplex (movie theater), multiplex cinemas.
Tel Aviv is an international hub of highly active and diverse nightlife with bars, dance bars and nightclub
A nightclub or dance club is a club that is open at night, usually for drinking, dancing and other entertainment. Nightclubs often have a Bar (establishment), bar and discotheque (usually simply known as disco) with a dance floor, laser lighti ...
s staying open well past midnight. The largest area for nightclubs is the Tel Aviv port, where the city's large, commercial clubs and bars draw big crowds of young clubbers from both Tel Aviv and neighboring cities. The South of Tel Aviv is known for the popular Haoman 17, Haoman 17 club, as well as for being the city's main hub of alternative clubbing, with underground venues including established clubs like the Block Club, Comfort 13 and Paradise Garage, as well as various warehouse and loft party venues. The Allenby/Rothschild area is another popular nightlife hub, featuring such clubs as the Pasaz, Radio EPGB and the Penguin. In 2013, Absolut Vodka introduced a specially designed bottle dedicated to Tel Aviv as part of its international cities series.
LGBT culture
Named "the best gay city in the world" by American Airlines, Tel Aviv is one of the most popular destinations for LGBT tourism, LGBT tourists internationally, with a large LGBT
LGBTQ people are individuals who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning. Many variants of the initialism are used; LGBTQIA+ people incorporates intersex, asexual, aromantic, agender, and other individuals. The gro ...
community. Approximately 25% of Tel Aviv's population identify as gay. American journalist David Kaufman (journalist), David Kaufman has described the city as a place "packed with the kind of 'we're here, we're queer', vibe more typically found in Sydney and San Francisco". The city hosts its well-known Tel Aviv Pride, pride parade, the biggest in Asia, attracting over 200,000 people yearly.
In January 2008, Tel Aviv's municipality established the city's Tel Aviv Municipal LGBT Community Center, LGBT Community center, providing all of the municipal and cultural services to the LGBT community under one roof. In December 2008, Tel Aviv began putting together a team of gay athletes for the 2009 World Outgames in Copenhagen. In addition, Tel Aviv hosts an annual LGBT film festival, known as TLVFest.
Tel Aviv's LGBT community is the subject of Eytan Fox's 2006 film ''The Bubble (2006 film), The Bubble''.
Fashion
Tel Aviv has become an international center of fashion and design. It has been called the "next hot destination" for fashion. Israeli designers, such as swimwear company Gottex show their collections at leading fashion shows, including New York's Bryant Park fashion show. In 2011, Tel Aviv hosted its first fashion week since the 1980s, with Italian designer Roberto Cavalli as a guest of honor.
Media
The three largest List of newspapers in Israel, newspaper companies in Israel: , Maariv (newspaper), Maariv and Haaretz are all based within the city limits. Several radio stations cover the Tel Aviv area, including the city-based Radio Tel Aviv.
The two major Israeli television networks, Keshet Media Group and Reshet, are based in the city, as well as two of the most popular radio stations in Israel: Israel Army Radio, Galatz and Galgalatz, which are both based in Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
. Studios of the international news channel i24news is located at Jaffa Port Customs House. An English language radio station, TLV1, is based at Kikar Hamedina.
Cuisine
Tel Aviv is famous for its wide variety of world-class restaurants, offering traditional Israeli dishes as well as international fare. More than 100 sushi restaurants, the third highest concentration in the world, do business in the city.
In Tel Aviv there are some dessert specialties, the most known is the Halva ice cream traditionally topped with date syrup and pistachios.
Sports
The city has a number of football stadiums, the largest of which is Bloomfield Stadium, which contains 29,400 seats used by Hapoel Tel Aviv F.C., Hapoel Tel Aviv, Maccabi Tel Aviv F.C., Maccabi Tel Aviv and Bnei Yehuda Tel Aviv F.C., Bnei Yehuda. Another stadium in the city is the Hatikva Neighborhood Stadium. Menora Mivtachim Arena is a large multi-purpose sports indoor arena, The arena is home to the Maccabi Tel Aviv B.C., Maccabi Tel Aviv, and the Drive in Arena, a multi-purpose hall that serves as the home ground of the Hapoel Tel Aviv B.C., Hapoel Tel Aviv. National Sport Center Tel Aviv (also Hadar Yosef Sports Center) is a compound of stadiums and sports facilities. It also houses the Olympic Committee of Israel and the National Athletics Stadium with the Israeli Athletic Association.
The Maccabi Tel Aviv, Maccabi Tel Aviv Sports Club was founded in 1906 and competes in more than 10 sport fields. Its basketball team, Maccabi Tel Aviv B.C., Maccabi Tel Aviv Basketball Club, is a world-known professional team, that holds 57 Israeli titles, has won 46 editions of the Israel cup, and has six European Championships, and its football team Maccabi Tel Aviv F.C., Maccabi Tel Aviv Football Club has won 25 Israeli league titles and has won 24 Israel State Cup, State Cups, eight Toto Cups and two AFC Champions League, Asian Club Championships. Yael Arad, an athlete in Maccabi's judo club, won a silver medal in the 1992 Summer Olympics, 1992 Olympic Games.
Hapoel Tel Aviv, Hapoel Tel Aviv Sports Club, founded in 1923, comprises more than 11 sports clubs, including Hapoel Tel Aviv F.C., Hapoel Tel Aviv Football Club (13 championships, 16 State Cups, one Toto Cup and once Asian champions) which plays in Bloomfield Stadium, and Hapoel Tel Aviv B.C., Hapoel Tel Aviv Basketball Club.
Bnei Yehuda Tel Aviv F.C., Bnei Yehuda Tel Aviv (once Israeli champion, twice Israel State Cup, State Cup winners and twice Toto Cup winner) is the Israeli football team that represents a neighborhood, the Hatikva Quarter
Hatikva Quarter (, ''Shkhunat Hatikva'') is a working class Neighborhoods of Tel Aviv, neighbourhood in southeastern Tel Aviv, Israel. History
The quarter was founded in 1935, named for "Mount Hope, Jaffa, Mount Hope" ("Har HaTikva" in Hebrew), a ...
in Tel Aviv, and not a city. Beitar Tel Aviv Bat Yam F.C., Beitar Tel Aviv formerly played in the top division, the club now playing in Liga Alef. Maccabi Jaffa F.C., Maccabi Jaffa formerly played in the top division, the club now playing in Liga Leumit and represents the Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
. Shimshon Tel Aviv F.C., Shimshon Tel Aviv formerly played in the top division, the club now playing in Liga Alef. There are more Tel Aviv football teams: Hapoel Kfar Shalem F.C., Hapoel Kfar Shalem, F.C. Bnei Jaffa Ortodoxim, Beitar Ezra F.C., Beitar Ezra, Beitar Jaffa F.C., Beitar Jaffa, Elitzur Jaffa Tel Aviv F.C., Elitzur Jaffa Tel Aviv, F.C. Roei Heshbon Tel Aviv, Gadna Tel Aviv Yehuda F.C., Gadna Tel Aviv Yehuda, Hapoel Kiryat Shalom F.C., Hapoel Kiryat Shalom, Hapoel Neve Golan F.C., Hapoel Neve Golan and Hapoel Ramat Yisrael F.C., Hapoel Ramat Yisrael.
Two rowing (sport), rowing clubs operate in Tel Aviv. The Tel Aviv Rowing Club, established in 1935 on the banks of the Yarkon River
The Yarkon River, also Yarqon River or Jarkon River (, ''Nahal HaYarkon''; , ''Nahr al-Auja''), is a river in central Israel. The source of the Yarkon ("Greenish" in Hebrew) is at Tel Afek (Antipatris), north of Petah Tikva. It flows west throu ...
, is the largest rowing club in Israel. Meanwhile, the beaches of Tel Aviv provide a vibrant Matkot (beach paddleball) scene. Tel Aviv Lightning represent Tel Aviv in the Israel Baseball League. Tel Aviv also has an annual half marathon, run in 2008 by 10,000 athletes with runners coming from around the world.
In 2009, the Tel Aviv Marathon was revived after a fifteen-year hiatus, and is run annually since, attracting a field of over 18,000 runners.
Transportation
Tel Aviv is a major transportation hub, served by a comprehensive public transport network, with many major routes of the national transportation network running through the city. As of 2023, 56% of the residents are going to work without using cars and the plan is to expand it to 70% by the end of the decade.
Bus and taxi
As with the rest of Israel, bus transport is the most common form of public transport and is very widely used. The Tel Aviv central bus station is located in the southern part of the city. The main bus network in Tel Aviv metropolitan area operated by Dan Bus Company, Metropoline, and Kavim. the Egged (company), Egged Bus Cooperative, Israels's largest bus company, provides intercity transportation.
The city is also served by local and inter-city share taxis. Many local and inter-city bus routes also have sherut taxis that follow the same route and display the same route number in their window. Fares are standardised within the region and are comparable to or less expensive than bus fares. Unlike other forms of public transport, these taxis also operate on Fridays and Saturdays (the Jewish sabbath "Shabbat"). Private taxis are white with a yellow sign on top. Fares are standardised and metered, but may be negotiated ahead of time with the driver.
Rail
The Tel Aviv Savidor Central railway station is the main railway station of the city, and the second-busiest station in Israel. The city has five additional Israel Railways, railway stations along the Ayalon Highway: three of them, Tel Aviv University railway station, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv HaShalom railway station, HaShalom (the busiest station in Israel, adjacent to Azrieli Center
Azrieli Center (; ''Merkaz Azrieli'') is a complex of three skyscrapers in Tel Aviv. At the base of the complex lies a large shopping mall. The complex was designed by Israeli-American architect Eli Attia. After Attia and the developer of the ...
) and Tel Aviv HaHagana railway station, HaHagana (near the Tel Aviv central bus station), serve Tel Aviv directly, while the remaining two, Holon Junction railway station, Holon Junction and Holon–Wolfson railway station, Holon–Wolfson, are within Tel Aviv's municipal boundaries but serve the southern suburb of Holon
Holon (, ) is a city in the Tel Aviv District of Israel, located south of Tel Aviv. Holon is part of the Gush Dan, Gush Dan metropolitan area. In , it had a population of , making it the List of cities in Israel, tenth most populous city in Isra ...
. It is estimated that over a million passengers travel by rail to Tel Aviv monthly. The trains do not run on Saturday and the principal Jewish festivals (Rosh Hashana (2 days), Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Simkhat Torah, Pessach (Passover) first and fifth days and Shavuot (Pentecost)). Jaffa railway station was the first railway station in the Levant. It served as the terminus for the Jaffa–Jerusalem railway. The station opened in 1891 and closed in 1948. In 2005–2009, the station was restored and converted into an entertainment and leisure venue marketed as "HaTachana", Hebrew for "the station" (see homepage here:). The Jaffa–Jerusalem railway also included the Tel Aviv Beit Hadar railway station, which was opened in 1920 and replaced in 1970, and the Tel Aviv South railway station, which was opened in 1970 to replace Beit Hadar and itself closed in 1993. The Bnei Brak–Ramat HaHayal railway station, Bnei Brak railway station, while located in Bnei Brak's municipal borders, is closer to the Tel Aviv neighborhood of Ramat HaHayal than to Bnei Brak's city center and was originally called Tel Aviv North.
Tel Aviv Light Rail is a mass transit system for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area. As of 2023, two LRT lines are under construction. Work on the Red Line (Tel Aviv Light Rail), Red Line, the first in the project, started on September 21, 2011, following years of preparatory works, and was expected to be completed and opened in late 2022 after numerous delays, and was finally opened on August 18, 2023, after the opening day was postponed numerous times. Construction of the Purple Line (Tel Aviv Light Rail), Purple Line started in December 2018; work on the Green Line (Tel Aviv Light Rail), Green Line began in 2021 and is scheduled for completion in 2028. Tel Aviv Metro is a proposed subway system for the Tel Aviv Metropolitan Area. It will augment the Tel Aviv Light Rail and Israel Railways suburban lines and 3 underground metro lines to form a rapid transit transportation solution for the city. Construction is expected to start in 2025, with the first public opening in 2032.
Roads
The main highway leading to and within the city is the Highway 20 (Israel), Ayalon Highway (Highway 20), which runs in the eastern side of the city from north to south along the Ayalon River riverbed. Driving south on Ayalon gives access to Highway 4 (Israel), Highway 4 leading to Ashdod, Highway 1 (Israel/Palestine), Highway 1, leading to Ben Gurion International Airport
Ben Gurion International Airport , commonly known by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the main international airport of Israel. Situated on outskirts north of the city of Lod and directly south of the city of Or Yehuda, it is the busies ...
and Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
and Highway 431 (Israel), Highway 431 leading to Jerusalem, Modiin, Rehovot
Rehovot (, / ) is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, about south of Tel Aviv. In it had a population of .
Etymology
Israel Belkind, founder of the Bilu (movement), Bilu movement, proposed the name "Rehovot ...
and the Highway 6 (Israel), Highway 6 Trans-Israel Highway. Driving north on Ayalon gives access to the Highway 2 (Israel), Highway 2 coastal road leading to Netanya, Hadera and Haifa
Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...
. Within the city, main routes include Kaplan Street, Allenby Street, Ibn Gabirol Street
Ibn Gabirol Street () (colloquially Ibn Gvirol or Even Gvirol) is a major street in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Ibn Gabirol Street is named after the medieval Hebrew poet and philosopher Solomon ibn Gabirol. It carries traffic north and south, and is a bus ...
, Dizengoff Street, Rothschild Boulevard
Rothschild Boulevard (, ''Sderot Rotshild'') is one of the principal streets in the center of Tel Aviv, Israel, beginning in Neve Tzedek at its southwestern edge and running north to Habima Theatre. It is one of the most expensive streets in the ...
, and in Jaffa the main route is Jerusalem Boulevard. Namir Road connects the city to Highway 2 (Israel), Highway 2, Israel's main north–south highway, and Begin/Jabotinsky Road, which provides access from the east through Ramat Gan, Bnei Brak
Bnei Brak ( ) or Bene Beraq, is a city located on the central Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean Israeli coastal plain, coastal plain in Israel, just east of Tel Aviv. A center of Haredi Judaism, Bnei Brak covers an area of 709 hectares (1,752 acre ...
and Petah Tikva. Tel Aviv, accommodating about 500,000 commuter cars daily, suffers from increasing congestion. In 2007, the Sadan Report recommended the introduction of a Road pricing, congestion charge similar to that of London in Tel Aviv as well as other Israeli cities. Under this plan, road users traveling into the city would pay a fixed fee.
Air
The main airport serving Greater Tel Aviv is Ben Gurion Airport, Ben Gurion International Airport. Located in an unincorporated area between the neighbouring cities of Lod and Or Yehuda, it handled over 20 million passengers in 2017. Ben Gurion is the main hub of El Al, Arkia, Israir, Israir Airlines and Sun d'Or. The airport is southeast of Tel Aviv, on Highway 1 (Israel), Highway 1 between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Sde Dov Airport
Sde Dov Airport (, ''lit.'' Dov Field, ), also known as Dov Hoz Airport (, ''Nemal HaTe'ufa Dov Hoz'', ) was an airport in Tel Aviv, Israel that mainly handled scheduled domestic flights to Eilat, northern Israel (Haifa, the Galilee, and the G ...
(IATA airport code, IATA: SDV), in northwestern Tel Aviv, is a domestic airport and was closed in 2019 in favor of real-estate development. All services to Sde Dov will be transferred to Ben Gurion Airport.
Cycling
The Tel Aviv Municipality encourages the use of bicycles in the city. Plans called for expansion of the paths to by 2009. By 2020, the city had 140 kilometres of bicycle paths with plans to reach 300 km by 2025. The city is at the center of the Ofnidan, a network of bicycle paths throughout the Gush Dan metropolitan area.
In April 2011, the Tel Aviv municipality launched Tel-O-Fun, a bicycle sharing system, in which 150 stations of bicycles for rent were installed within the city limits.
Foreign relations
The municipality of Tel Aviv signed agreements with many cities worldwide.
Explanatory notes
References
General bibliography
* Michael Turner, Catherine Weill-Rochant, Geneviève Blondiau, Silvina Sosnovsky, Philippe Brandeis, ''Sur les traces du modernisme, Tel Aviv-Haïfa-Jérusalem'', CIVA (ed.), Bruxelles, 2004 .
* Jochen Visscher (ed.): ''Tel Aviv: The White City'', Photographs by Stefan Boness, JOVIS Verlag Berlin 2012. .
* Catherine Weill-Rochant, ''L'Atlas de Tel Aviv 1908–2008'', Paris, CNRS Editions, 2008 (historical maps and photos, French, soon in Hebrew and English).
*Catherine Weill-Rochant, ''Bauhaus " – Architektur in Tel-Aviv, L'architecture " Bauhaus " à Tel Aviv'', Rita Gans (éd.), Zürich, Yad Yearim, 2008 .
*Catherine Weill-Rochant, "The Tel Aviv School: a constrained rationalism", ''DOCOMOMO journal'' (documentation and conservation of buildings, sites and neighbourhoods of the modern movement), April 2009.
* And:
*Catherine Weill-Rochant, ''Le travail de Patrick Geddes à Tel-Aviv, un plan d'ombre et de lumière'', Saarbrücken, Éditions Universitaires Européennes, May 2010.
External links
Official website
() of The Tel Aviv municipality
Tel Aviv
(official travel website)
Tel Aviv Foundation
{{Authority control
Tel Aviv,
1909 establishments in the Ottoman Empire
Articles containing video clips
Cities in Israel
Cities in Tel Aviv District
Jewish villages in the Ottoman Empire
Mediterranean port cities and towns in Israel
Populated places established in 1909