Abu Kabir
Encyclopedia
Abu Kabir was a satellite village of Jaffa
founded by Egyptians following Ibrahim Pasha
's 1832 defeat of Turkish forces in Ottoman
era Palestine
. After Israel
's establishment in 1948, the area became part of Tel Aviv
. It was officially named Giv'at Herzl
' onMouseout='HidePop("21876")' href="/topics/Herzl">Herzl
's hill), but is still known as Abu Kabir .
ian troops of Ibrahim Pasha
captured the city of Jaffa and its environs following a battle with the forces of the Ottoman Empire in 1832. Though Egyptian rule over this area continued only until 1840, Egyptian Muslims settled in and around Jaffa, founding the village of Sakhanat Abu Kabir, along with Sakhanat al-Muzariyya, among others. An eastern suburb of Jaffa, many of the Egyptians who populated it came from the village of Tall al Kabir
(or Tel
Abu Kabir), and named it for their hometown.
, the French archaeologist, visited in 1873-1874, searching for the site of the ancient Jewish cemetery of Joppa (Jaffa). He describes "Saknet Abu K'bir" as a hamlet, and relates walking through the "extensive gardens that close in Jaffa on every side" to reach it. He notes that during the heavy winter rains, the gardens between Jaffa and Saknet Abu Kabir became a small marshy lake that was known as al-Bassa by the locals. Noting that this name is commonly used throughout Syria for seasonal ponds of this nature and recalling that the bissah of the Hebrew Bible
also means pond, he suggests that the similarity in the Arabic and Hebrew indicates a borrowing from even earlier linguistic traditions.
Under an entry entitled The Jewish necropolis of Joppa, Clermont-Ganneau relates that after inquiring with the local fellahin (peasants) in Abu Kabir, he was led "a few yards further on" from the hamlet, "in the middle of some poorly tilled gardens," where building stone was quarried by the villagers. Laid bare by their activities were, "sepulchral chambers hollowed out in the calcareous tufa." He notes that similar graves were said to found in the lands between Abu Kabir to as far as Mikveh Israel
and the Catholic cemetery. Other fellahin told him of finds between Saknet Abu Kabir and Saknet al-'Abid, and still others told of artifacts that they had retrieved from them. One artifact was brought to him which he purchased: a small marble titulus
with a four-line Greek inscription and a seven-branched candlestick (or menorah). Clermont-Ganneau identified this as Helleno-Jewish funeral epigraphy, ascribing it to Hezekiah
, and writes that it, "settled once and for all the nature of the burial ground I had just discovered." In a letter published by the Palestine Exploration Fund
, he expressed his hope to return noting, "We must at least find two or three more inscriptions of the same kind coming from the same neighbourhood." Locating the tombs within a circle called, "Ardh (or Jebel) Dhabitha," he notes the area extends over, "the great gardens outside Jaffa, bounded by a little hamlet called Abou K'bir* (Abu Kebir), and by the well of Aboa Nabbout (Abu Nabbut
)."
The Jewish necropolis
was looted mainly during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Dating the site is a challenge due to the lack of objects found in situ, but estimates are that the tombs were used between the 3rd and 5th centuries AD. Most of the necropolis is now in the area of the Russian Orthodox Saint Peter's Church compound.
According to Mark LeVine
, the Biluim pioneers set up a commune
among the orange and lemon groves of the Abu Kabir neighborhood between 1882 and 1884. The house used by the commune members is now located in the Neve Ofer neighborhood of Tel Aviv.
, the violence reached Abu Kabir. The Jewish Yitzker family owned a dairy farm on the outskirts of the neighborhood, in which they rented out rooms. At the time of the riots, Yosef Haim Brenner
, one of the pioneers of modern Hebrew literature was living at the site. On May 2, 1921, despite warnings Yitzker and Brenner refused to leave the farm and were murdered, along with Yitzker's teenaged son, his son-in-law and two other renters.
As Jaffa expanded during the 1920s and 1930s, Abu Kabir was incorporated within the municipal boundaries of Jaffa but retained much of its agricultural character. It consisted of a main built-up part bordering the Jewish sector of Jaffa from the south, and several small concentrations of houses within the surrounding citrus groves.
In the wake of violence on the border between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv's leaders suggested annexing the Jewish neighborhoods of Jaffa to Tel Aviv. They proposed that the whole of Manshiyya, including Hassan Bey Mosque, as well as large parts of the Abu Kabir neighborhood, be transferred to the borders of the new Jewish city and state."
On August 23, 1944, the British Criminal Investigation Department
(CID) barracks at Jaffa, and police stations at Abu Kabir and Neve Shaanan were raided for arms by the Irgun
.
's Kiryati Brigade
blew up an Arab house in Abu Kabir, and the IZL torched several buildings four days later, killing at least two persons.
During Operation Lamed Hey (Hebrew for "35"), named for the 35 casualties of an attack on the Convoy of 35
, Abu Kabir was raided to "cleanse it of the forces acting there." On the night of 12–13 February 1948, the Haganah struck simultaneously at Abu Kabir, Jibalia, Tel a-Rish and the village of Yazur
. At Abu Kabir, 13 Arabs were killed, including the Mukhtar
, and 22 injured. A second major attack on Abu Kabir was launched on 13 March, the objective of which was, "the destruction of the Abu Kabir neighborhood". By this time the neighborhood was mostly abandoned by its inhabitants and was guarded by a few dozen militiamen. Sappers blew up a number of houses and this was the first attack in which Yishuv
-produced Davidka
mortars were used to shell the neighborhood. Inaccurate and very loud, the mortars had a demoralizing effect claimed to have reached "as far as Gaza".
A month after Abu Kabir was conquered, David Ben-Gurion
told the Israeli Provisional Government that Jaffa's Arab population should not be allowd to return: "If there will be [an] Abu Kebir again - this would be impossible. The world needs to understand we are 700,000 against 27 million, one against forty ... It won't be acceptable to us for Abu Kebir to be Arab again."
Walid Khalidi
writes that the Haganah completed the demolition of Abu Kabir by March 31. On April 19, 1948, The Palestine Post reported that "In the Abu Kebir area, the Haganah dispersed Arabs who tried to erect an emplacement facing the Aka factory in Givat Herzl. Two Arabs were shot as they approached the Maccabi Quarter."
, although the Arabic name, Abu Kabir, is still used. The Tel Aviv Municipality offered Prof. Heinrich Mendelssohn, Director of the Biological-Pedagogical Institute, the option of moving the Institute to Abu Kabir, and it was moved into a structure originally planned as a hospital. Haim Levanon, Deputy Mayor of Tel Aviv in the early 1950s and mayor from 1953-59 energetically campaigned for the founding of a university in Tel Aviv. The idea was realized on August 16, 1953, when the Municipal Council of Tel Aviv-Yafo decided to transform the Biological-Pedagogical Institute into the Academic Institute of Natural Sciences, under the leadership of Prof. Mendelssohn, which would "form the core of a future university." The Abu Kabir campus in southern Tel Aviv had 24 students in its first year.
In 1954, the Academic Institute of Jewish Studies was established in Abu Kabir. A university library was also founded, new study tracks were opened, a teaching staff was formed, laboratories and classrooms were built, and an administration established for the campus. In the same year, the L. Greenberg Institute of Forensic Medicine, also known colloquially as the "Abu Kabir Forensic Institute
was established.
In 1956, the Academic Institutes were officially upgraded into the new "University of Tel Aviv". The Zoological Gardens became part of the University. The Zoological and Botanical Gardens were moved to the Ramat Aviv
campus in 1981. The Nature Gardens still host the original facilities. The gardens at Abu Kabir are recommended in an Israeli guide to Tel Aviv as a destination for nature lovers. In the tour book Israel and the Palestinian territories (1998), "the former village of Abu Kabir" is described as being located in a green space to the east of Jaffa
.
Salvage excavations were undertaken by Israeli archaeologists in the burial complex at "Saknat Abu Kabir" in 1991.
The Tel Aviv Detention Facility, known as the Abu Kabir Prison is also in the area.
's satirical short story, "The Economics of Babysitting" (1989), the main character, a male babysitter, speaks of the beauty of strolling through Tel Aviv at night, and one of the places he mentions as being especially beautiful, is the "Abu Kabir Plain."
Jaffa
Jaffa is an ancient port city believed to be one of the oldest in the world. Jaffa was incorporated with Tel Aviv creating the city of Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel. Jaffa is famous for its association with the biblical story of the prophet Jonah.-Etymology:...
founded by Egyptians following Ibrahim Pasha
Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt
Ibrahim Pasha was the eldest son of Muhammad Ali, the Wāli and unrecognised Khedive of Egypt and Sudan. He served as a general in the Egyptian army that his father established during his reign, taking his first command of Egyptian forces was when he was merely a teenager...
's 1832 defeat of Turkish forces in Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
era Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
. After Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
's establishment in 1948, the area became part of Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...
. It was officially named Giv'at Herzl
Giv'at Herzl
Givat Herzl is a neighborhood located in the southern part of Tel Aviv, Israel. It contains an ancient Jewish necropolis which was looted mainly during the late 19th and early 20th centuries....
' onMouseout='HidePop("21876")' href="/topics/Herzl">Herzl
Herzl
Herzl is originally a Yiddish given name.* Herzl Berger* Herzl Bodinger* Theodor Herzl Gaster* Cyrus Herzl Gordon* Yehudah Herzl Henkin* Herzl Rosenblum* Herzl Yankl Tsam- Family name :* Theodor Herzl, most famous "Herzl"** Herzl Award...
's hill), but is still known as Abu Kabir .
Egyptian rule
The EgyptEgypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
ian troops of Ibrahim Pasha
Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt
Ibrahim Pasha was the eldest son of Muhammad Ali, the Wāli and unrecognised Khedive of Egypt and Sudan. He served as a general in the Egyptian army that his father established during his reign, taking his first command of Egyptian forces was when he was merely a teenager...
captured the city of Jaffa and its environs following a battle with the forces of the Ottoman Empire in 1832. Though Egyptian rule over this area continued only until 1840, Egyptian Muslims settled in and around Jaffa, founding the village of Sakhanat Abu Kabir, along with Sakhanat al-Muzariyya, among others. An eastern suburb of Jaffa, many of the Egyptians who populated it came from the village of Tall al Kabir
Tall al Kabir
Tall al Kebir or Tel-el-Kebir is 110 km north-north-east of Cairo and 75 kilometres south of Port Said on the edge of the Egyptian desert at the altitude of 29 m...
(or Tel
Tell
A tell or tel, is a type of archaeological mound created by human occupation and abandonment of a geographical site over many centuries. A classic tell looks like a low, truncated cone with a flat top and sloping sides.-Archaeology:A tell is a hill created by different civilizations living and...
Abu Kabir), and named it for their hometown.
Ottoman period
In The Survey of Western Palestine (1881), its name is recorded as Sâknet Abu Kebîr and it is translated as, "The settlement of Abu Kebir p.n.; (great father)." Charles Simon Clermont-GanneauCharles Simon Clermont-Ganneau
Charles Simon Clermont-Ganneau was a noted French Orientalist and archaeologist.-Biography:Clermont-Ganneau was born in Paris, son of a sculptor of some repute...
, the French archaeologist, visited in 1873-1874, searching for the site of the ancient Jewish cemetery of Joppa (Jaffa). He describes "Saknet Abu K'bir" as a hamlet, and relates walking through the "extensive gardens that close in Jaffa on every side" to reach it. He notes that during the heavy winter rains, the gardens between Jaffa and Saknet Abu Kabir became a small marshy lake that was known as al-Bassa by the locals. Noting that this name is commonly used throughout Syria for seasonal ponds of this nature and recalling that the bissah of the Hebrew Bible
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
also means pond, he suggests that the similarity in the Arabic and Hebrew indicates a borrowing from even earlier linguistic traditions.
Under an entry entitled The Jewish necropolis of Joppa, Clermont-Ganneau relates that after inquiring with the local fellahin (peasants) in Abu Kabir, he was led "a few yards further on" from the hamlet, "in the middle of some poorly tilled gardens," where building stone was quarried by the villagers. Laid bare by their activities were, "sepulchral chambers hollowed out in the calcareous tufa." He notes that similar graves were said to found in the lands between Abu Kabir to as far as Mikveh Israel
Mikveh Israel
The name Mikveh Israel may refer to:* Mikveh Israel, agricultural school and village in Israel* Congregation Mikveh Israel, Philadelphia, United States* Congregation Mickve Israel, Savannah, Georgia, United States...
and the Catholic cemetery. Other fellahin told him of finds between Saknet Abu Kabir and Saknet al-'Abid, and still others told of artifacts that they had retrieved from them. One artifact was brought to him which he purchased: a small marble titulus
Titulus (inscription)
Titulus is a term used for the labels or captions naming figures or subjects in art, which were commonly added in classical and medieval art, and remain conventional in Eastern Orthodox icons...
with a four-line Greek inscription and a seven-branched candlestick (or menorah). Clermont-Ganneau identified this as Helleno-Jewish funeral epigraphy, ascribing it to Hezekiah
Hezekiah
Hezekiah was the son of Ahaz and the 14th king of Judah. Edwin Thiele has concluded that his reign was between c. 715 and 686 BC. He is also one of the most prominent kings of Judah mentioned in the Hebrew Bible....
, and writes that it, "settled once and for all the nature of the burial ground I had just discovered." In a letter published by the Palestine Exploration Fund
Palestine Exploration Fund
The Palestine Exploration Fund is a British society often simply known as the PEF. It was founded in 1865 and is still functioning today. Its initial object was to carry out surveys of the topography and ethnography of Ottoman Palestine with a remit that fell somewhere between an expeditionary...
, he expressed his hope to return noting, "We must at least find two or three more inscriptions of the same kind coming from the same neighbourhood." Locating the tombs within a circle called, "Ardh (or Jebel) Dhabitha," he notes the area extends over, "the great gardens outside Jaffa, bounded by a little hamlet called Abou K'bir* (Abu Kebir), and by the well of Aboa Nabbout (Abu Nabbut
Sabil Abu Nabbut
Sabil Abu Nabbut also known as Tabitha's Well is a public fountain in Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, constructed during the Ottoman era in Palestine. Its main purpose was to facilitate the journey between Jaffa and Jerusalem....
)."
The Jewish necropolis
Necropolis
A necropolis is a large cemetery or burial ground, usually including structural tombs. The word comes from the Greek νεκρόπολις - nekropolis, literally meaning "city of the dead"...
was looted mainly during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Dating the site is a challenge due to the lack of objects found in situ, but estimates are that the tombs were used between the 3rd and 5th centuries AD. Most of the necropolis is now in the area of the Russian Orthodox Saint Peter's Church compound.
According to Mark LeVine
Mark LeVine
Mark LeVine is a professor of history at the University of California, Irvine. He is also a musician. He received his B.A. in comparative religion and biblical studies from Hunter College and his M.A. and Ph.D. from New York University's Department of Middle Eastern Studies...
, the Biluim pioneers set up a commune
Commune
Commune may refer to:In society:* Commune, a human community in which resources are shared* Commune , a township or municipality* One of the Communes of France* An Italian Comune...
among the orange and lemon groves of the Abu Kabir neighborhood between 1882 and 1884. The house used by the commune members is now located in the Neve Ofer neighborhood of Tel Aviv.
British Mandate period
During the 1921 Jaffa RiotsJaffa riots
The Jaffa riots were a series of violent riots in Palestine on May 1–7, 1921, which began as a fight between two Jewish groups but developed into an attack by Arabs on Jews during which many were killed...
, the violence reached Abu Kabir. The Jewish Yitzker family owned a dairy farm on the outskirts of the neighborhood, in which they rented out rooms. At the time of the riots, Yosef Haim Brenner
Yosef Haim Brenner
Yosef Haim Brenner was a Russian-born Hebrew-language author, one of the pioneers of modern Hebrew literature.-Biography:Brenner was born to a poor Jewish family in Novi Mlini, Russian Empire...
, one of the pioneers of modern Hebrew literature was living at the site. On May 2, 1921, despite warnings Yitzker and Brenner refused to leave the farm and were murdered, along with Yitzker's teenaged son, his son-in-law and two other renters.
As Jaffa expanded during the 1920s and 1930s, Abu Kabir was incorporated within the municipal boundaries of Jaffa but retained much of its agricultural character. It consisted of a main built-up part bordering the Jewish sector of Jaffa from the south, and several small concentrations of houses within the surrounding citrus groves.
In the wake of violence on the border between Jaffa and Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv's leaders suggested annexing the Jewish neighborhoods of Jaffa to Tel Aviv. They proposed that the whole of Manshiyya, including Hassan Bey Mosque, as well as large parts of the Abu Kabir neighborhood, be transferred to the borders of the new Jewish city and state."
On August 23, 1944, the British Criminal Investigation Department
Criminal Investigation Department
The Crime Investigation Department is the branch of all Territorial police forces within the British Police and many other Commonwealth police forces, to which plain clothes detectives belong. It is thus distinct from the Uniformed Branch and the Special Branch.The Metropolitan Police Service CID,...
(CID) barracks at Jaffa, and police stations at Abu Kabir and Neve Shaanan were raided for arms by the Irgun
Irgun
The Irgun , or Irgun Zevai Leumi to give it its full title , was a Zionist paramilitary group that operated in Mandate Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of the earlier and larger Jewish paramilitary organization haHaganah...
.
1947-1948 war
In 1947, Abu Kabir was situated at the entrance to Tel Aviv on the main road to Jerusalem.On 30 November 1947, the day after the UN voted on the Partition Plan, an Arab mob in Abu Kabir attacked a car with Jewish passengers, killing all three. Jewish retaliatory strikes followed. On 2 December the HaganahHaganah
Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces.- Origins :...
's Kiryati Brigade
Kiryati Brigade
The Kiryati Brigade was formed in 1948 by David Ben-Gurion and was one of the original nine brigades that made up the Haganah. The Kiryati Brigade was initially responsible for securing the area in and around Tel Aviv...
blew up an Arab house in Abu Kabir, and the IZL torched several buildings four days later, killing at least two persons.
During Operation Lamed Hey (Hebrew for "35"), named for the 35 casualties of an attack on the Convoy of 35
Convoy of 35
The Convoy of 35 refers to 35 soldiers of the Haganah who were killed while attempting to resupply and or reinforce the Gush Etzion kibbutzim by foot on January 16, 1948, after a number of convoys had been attacked during the early stages of the 1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine.- Attack...
, Abu Kabir was raided to "cleanse it of the forces acting there." On the night of 12–13 February 1948, the Haganah struck simultaneously at Abu Kabir, Jibalia, Tel a-Rish and the village of Yazur
Yazur
Yazur was an Arab town located east of Jaffa. Mentioned in 7th century BCE Assyrian texts, the village was a site of contestation between Muslims and Crusaders in the 12th century....
. At Abu Kabir, 13 Arabs were killed, including the Mukhtar
Mukhtar
Mukhtar meaning "chosen" in Arabic, refers to the head of a village or mahalle in many Arab countries as well as in Turkey and Cyprus. The name refers to the fact that mukhtars are usually selected by some consensual or participatory method, often involving an election. Mukhtar is also a common...
, and 22 injured. A second major attack on Abu Kabir was launched on 13 March, the objective of which was, "the destruction of the Abu Kabir neighborhood". By this time the neighborhood was mostly abandoned by its inhabitants and was guarded by a few dozen militiamen. Sappers blew up a number of houses and this was the first attack in which Yishuv
Yishuv
The Yishuv or Ha-Yishuv is the term referring to the body of Jewish residents in Palestine before the establishment of the State of Israel...
-produced Davidka
Davidka
The Davidka was a homemade Israeli mortar used in Safed and Jerusalem during the early stages of the 1948 Israeli War of Independence. Its bombs were reported to be extremely loud, but very inaccurate and otherwise of little value beyond terrifying opponents; they proved particularly useful in...
mortars were used to shell the neighborhood. Inaccurate and very loud, the mortars had a demoralizing effect claimed to have reached "as far as Gaza".
A month after Abu Kabir was conquered, David Ben-Gurion
David Ben-Gurion
' was the first Prime Minister of Israel.Ben-Gurion's passion for Zionism, which began early in life, led him to become a major Zionist leader and Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization in 1946...
told the Israeli Provisional Government that Jaffa's Arab population should not be allowd to return: "If there will be [an] Abu Kebir again - this would be impossible. The world needs to understand we are 700,000 against 27 million, one against forty ... It won't be acceptable to us for Abu Kebir to be Arab again."
Walid Khalidi
Walid Khalidi
Walid Khalidi is an Oxford University-educated Palestinian historian who has written extensively on the Palestinian exodus. He is General Secretary and co-founder of the Institute for Palestine Studies, established in Beirut in December 1963 as an independent research and publishing center...
writes that the Haganah completed the demolition of Abu Kabir by March 31. On April 19, 1948, The Palestine Post reported that "In the Abu Kebir area, the Haganah dispersed Arabs who tried to erect an emplacement facing the Aka factory in Givat Herzl. Two Arabs were shot as they approached the Maccabi Quarter."
State of Israel
After 1948, Abu Kabir was renamed Giv'at HerzlGiv'at Herzl
Givat Herzl is a neighborhood located in the southern part of Tel Aviv, Israel. It contains an ancient Jewish necropolis which was looted mainly during the late 19th and early 20th centuries....
, although the Arabic name, Abu Kabir, is still used. The Tel Aviv Municipality offered Prof. Heinrich Mendelssohn, Director of the Biological-Pedagogical Institute, the option of moving the Institute to Abu Kabir, and it was moved into a structure originally planned as a hospital. Haim Levanon, Deputy Mayor of Tel Aviv in the early 1950s and mayor from 1953-59 energetically campaigned for the founding of a university in Tel Aviv. The idea was realized on August 16, 1953, when the Municipal Council of Tel Aviv-Yafo decided to transform the Biological-Pedagogical Institute into the Academic Institute of Natural Sciences, under the leadership of Prof. Mendelssohn, which would "form the core of a future university." The Abu Kabir campus in southern Tel Aviv had 24 students in its first year.
In 1954, the Academic Institute of Jewish Studies was established in Abu Kabir. A university library was also founded, new study tracks were opened, a teaching staff was formed, laboratories and classrooms were built, and an administration established for the campus. In the same year, the L. Greenberg Institute of Forensic Medicine, also known colloquially as the "Abu Kabir Forensic Institute
Abu Kabir Forensic Institute
L. Greenberg National Institute of Forensic Medicine also known as Abu Kabir Forensic Institute, is an Israeli forensic research laboratory located in the Abu Kabir neighborhood of Tel Aviv, Israel.-History:...
was established.
In 1956, the Academic Institutes were officially upgraded into the new "University of Tel Aviv". The Zoological Gardens became part of the University. The Zoological and Botanical Gardens were moved to the Ramat Aviv
Ramat Aviv
Ramat Aviv is the name of several neighborhoods in the Northwest District of Tel Aviv, Israel:* Ramat Aviv Aleph * Ramat Aviv Bet * Ramat Aviv Gimmel...
campus in 1981. The Nature Gardens still host the original facilities. The gardens at Abu Kabir are recommended in an Israeli guide to Tel Aviv as a destination for nature lovers. In the tour book Israel and the Palestinian territories (1998), "the former village of Abu Kabir" is described as being located in a green space to the east of Jaffa
Jaffa
Jaffa is an ancient port city believed to be one of the oldest in the world. Jaffa was incorporated with Tel Aviv creating the city of Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel. Jaffa is famous for its association with the biblical story of the prophet Jonah.-Etymology:...
.
Salvage excavations were undertaken by Israeli archaeologists in the burial complex at "Saknat Abu Kabir" in 1991.
The Tel Aviv Detention Facility, known as the Abu Kabir Prison is also in the area.
Literary references
In Ephraim KishonEphraim Kishon
' was an Israeli author, dramatist, screenwriter, and film director. He is one of the most widely-read contemporary satirists in the world.- Early life and World War II :...
's satirical short story, "The Economics of Babysitting" (1989), the main character, a male babysitter, speaks of the beauty of strolling through Tel Aviv at night, and one of the places he mentions as being especially beautiful, is the "Abu Kabir Plain."