STRONGHOLDING THE SYNAGOGUE TO STRONGHOLD THE CITY: URBAN-RELIGIOUS CONFIGURATIONS IN AN ISRAELI MIXED-CITY
MORIEL RAM & MEIRAV AHARON GUTMAN Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel. E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]
Received: October 2015; accepted September 2016
ABSTRACT This article explores the geopolitical significance of public religious institutions and the ways in which it has corresponded to changes in their urban environment. Based on a spatial analysis and ethnography of urban synagogues in the northern Israeli mixed city of Acre that were established and constructed by communities of Jewish immigrants from North African countries, we demonstrate how significant shifts in the city’s demographic pattern and landscape have affected these institutions’ ascribed functions and meanings. We theorise this dynamic as ‘strongholding’, or, more specifically, strongholding the synagogue as a means of strongholding the city. The formation of the synagogue as a stronghold is enacted through a dual configuration process by which the religious legitimacy, which the synagogue bestows on those who maintain it, is interwoven into a broader urban sociopolitical struggle to claim a presence in the city.
Key words: Religion, Israel-Palestine, mixed cities, synagogues, urban-religious configuration
INTRODUCTION their worship a ‘public prayer’ (tefilat tzibur). According to Jewish custom, public prayer is It is approximately ten past seven in the considered prayer on behalf of the commu- morning in the Mediterranean coastal plain nity and therefore holds greater spiritual sig- city of Acre in northern Israel. Jewish wor- nificance than the prayer of any one shippers are beginning to trickle in to Rakia particular individual. From this perspective, a Marom (Hebrew for ‘Heaven’s High’) syna- minyan is what turns a synagogue into a pub- gogue for Shaharit, the morning Jewish lic space. prayer service. The house of prayer is located When it becomes clear that they lack inside a bomb shelter, which was converted enough men to form a minyan, the tension into a synagogue during the 1970s, soon mounts, and the atmosphere in the syna- after the neighbourhood’s construction. gogue gradually morphs into one better Those arriving begin to recite the prayers suited for a war room than a house of prayer. quietly, each in his own designated spot. Worshippers whip out their mobile phones, Today, however, there is a palpable tension attempting to mobilise sons, neighbours and in the air. Every now and then someone friends. An older man named Menachem, a looks up to assess whether enough men have regular at Rakia Marom, goes outside and arrived. The number they need is ten, as it shouts up at the windows of the homes on takes ten Jewish men to form a minyan – the the block, trying to wake some of the resi- quorum required under Jewish law to render dents he knows. Pinchas, also an older man
Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie – 2017, DOI:10.1111/tesg.12231, Vol. 00, No. 00, pp. 00–00. VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG 2 MORIEL RAM & MEIRAV AHARON GUTMAN and another synagogue regular, expresses his manifested in our main case study of urban approval of Menachem’s rallying cry: ‘Good, synagogues established by Mizrachi commun- let him shout. I want them to hear that there ities in the ethno-nationally mixed city of are not enough men here’. Those who do Acre. We conclude with reflections on the eventually arrive for the prayer service are ways in which the notion of the ‘stronghold’ reprimanded. ‘Where have you been?’ asks and ‘strongholding’ can enrich our under- Aharon, one of the more frequent attendees, stating of urban-religious configurations. addressing a man who had not shown up for prayers the previous day, remarking half- URBAN-RELIGIOUS DIALOGUES jokingly that the man has gone AWOL (absent without leave, or nifkad in Hebrew). From their very inception, religions and This comparison between AWOL soldiers urban environments have been closely inter- and people who fail to show up for daily twined, with religion shaping, defining, and prayers provides us a metonymic illustration giving meaning to built environments, and of the formation of the synagogue as a stronghold that needs to be maintained at all built environments providing the physical costs, for the sake of preserving and strength- infrastructure in which religions function. ening the Jewish identity of the locality in Nonetheless, the modern Western city has which it is situated. This dynamic, which we been perceived and conceived primarily as a theorise here as ‘strongholding’, or more secular space bent on dismantling rather specifically, strongholding the synagogue as a than securing traditional institutions (Garbin means of strongholding the city, is enacted 2012). It is therefore no surprise that a prev- through a dual configuration process by alent assumption of the scholarship on the which the religious legitimacy that the syna- contemporary built environment has been gogue bestows on those who maintain it is the continued contraction of religion’s ability interwoven into a broader urban sociopoliti- to shape city spheres and the fading potency cal struggle to claim a presence in the city. of the relationship between faith and urban- In this way, the synagogue can be understood ity (Lanz 2013). as both an urban place that enables its In recent years, however, it has become attendees to practice their religious identity extremely clear that the potency of this rela- and a means of forging a claim to the city tionship is far from fading and in fact consti- through religious practice. tutes the beating heart of many city spheres This paper explores the dual process of around the globe (Kong 2010; Gokarıksel€ & configuration through which the synagogue Secor 2015). One of the main issues consid- becomes a stronghold. The first sections sit- ered in the discussion of religious presence uate our discussion within the contemporary in the city is reciprocity, as an increasing effort to let religion ‘speak back’ to geogra- number of works have focused on the impact phers (Yorgason & Della Dora 2009) by using of the urban experience on the ways in Lanz’s (2013) notion of urban-religious con- which religion is practiced and experienced figurations, in which the urban and the reli- as an urban phenomenon (Orsi 2002). gious are in constant dialogue, and discuss Yorgason and della Dora (2009, p. 631) how the concept of the synagogue as an point out the growing need to let religion urban stronghold can be understood as a ‘speak back’ to geographers and urban schol- particular form of urban-religious configura- ars in order to problematise the disciplinary tion that enables religion to ‘speak back’ to narrative of the human geographer. Implicit the city. We then place this discussion within in this call is the fact that religion speaks the empirical context of the Israeli- back not just to geographers but to the city Palestinian conflict, in which national aspira- itself. That is to say, when religion is reorgan- tions for spatial domination are laced with ised to accommodate or challenge urban religious practices, and demonstrate how the dynamics, regulations, and norms, it is in urban-religious configuration of stronghold- response to changes and conflicts taking ing the synagogue to stronghold the city is place in the city. Religion’s powerful capacity
VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG STRONGHOLDING THE SYNAGOGUE TO STRONGHOLD THE CITY 3 to carve up communal space in the city and of two frameworks that have yet to receive to reorganise its built environment is attested sufficient academic attention. to, for example, in Vincent and Warf’s The first is religious discourse’s overall piv- (2002) analysis of the practice of Eruv as well otal influence over the geopolitics of the as Valins’s (2003) work on ultra-orthodox contemporary city (Dumper 2014), which is Jewish communities in Manchester; Chiodel- particularly pertinent to the empirical con- li’s (2015) review of Muslim spatiality in text of the urban geopolitical conflict Milan; and Finlayson’s (2012) work on the between Israelis and Palestinians and its sacred spatialities created by the church in impact on Israel’s mixed cities (Yacobi 2009; Tallahassee. Monterescu 2011; Piroyanski 2014), where However, as Lanz (2013) argues, when ethno-national strife is entwined with reli- talking about religion in the city, one must gious identity (Yiftachel & Roded 2010). In not forget the city itself, meaning, the ways this asymmetrical confrontation, Israel’s Jew- in which the urban impacts and shapes new ish majority enjoys the support of the state, forms of religion and the ways in which reli- maintains sovereign power, and enforces ter- gious communities and practices affect the ritorial domination through various govern- city (Wilford 2012; Middleton & Yarwood ment techniques to maintain its hold over 2013). Watson’s (2005) discussion of the most resources (Yiftachel & Yacobi 2004). practice of the Eruv in London and New Jer- As the primal rationalisation of the Jewish sey and Kuppinger’s (2014) research on the national project is a specific form of national- measure of flexibility provided by the Muslim ised religious discourse, the ethnonational space in German cities represent a call to conflict in this context has a distinct religious underpinning. Thus far, most of the litera- understand both the manifestation of reli- ture addressing the manifestation of religious gion in the urban sphere and urban gover- discourse has focused on Palestinian society nance’s responsibility for novel forms of and dealt primarily with the national conflict communal experience through religion. Sim- with Israel (Reiter et al. 2012; Dumper 2014). ilarly, Andersson et al. (2011) consider not Jabareen (2006) has shown how the national only how churches affect and give meaning struggle has been manifested in different to urban encounters but also the city’s Israeli planning policies that impinge on Pal- impact on the ways in which churchgoers estinian urban environments within Israel, view difference, namely in relation to creating tension and distrust that can erupt sexuality. in the form of intercommunal conflicts The challenge, therefore, is not only to revolving around the usage of religious insti- allow religion to ‘speak back’ but to under- tutions (see also Rabinowitz 2001; Collins- stand how it converses with the city by identi- Kreiner et al. 2013). Luz (2008, 2015) has fying the forms of dialogue between the examined how mosques are shaped as reli- urban and the religious and how we can go gious institutions that function concurrently about locating them (Naylor & Ryan 2000). as sites of Palestinian resistance to Israeli Lanz offers to meet this challenge through planning norms. In addition, Yacobi (2009) the notion of ‘configuration’ as an effective has considered how Palestinian residents of methodological tool for analysing the forms the mixed city of Lydda employ religious of interaction between the religious and the practices to produce spaces of protest against urban that ‘reciprocally produce, influence the authority of the state, which is constantly and transform each other’ (Lanz 2008, p. seeking to marginalise their collective pres- 1 30). Indeed, the concept of configuration ence in the city. provides us a useful analytical tool for under- These studies all offer discerning accounts standing this dialogue, and the constant rear- of the interreligious conflict, both in Pales- rangement of interaction between religion tinian communities within Israel and in the and the city. Our work corresponds with the West Bank (Bowman 2012), and highlight effort to unravel religion’s configuration the importance of understanding the ways in within the city by analysing it in the context which urban dynamics of change can assume
VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG 4 MORIEL RAM & MEIRAV AHARON GUTMAN the form of daily struggle within a national synagogues into the urban sphere (Kalmar conflict through increasingly religious 2001; Bush 2004; Stanger-Ross 2006), we con- practices. duct this discussion in the context of an Our second empirical framework engages urban environment that is also part of an with a social grouping of Jewish immigrants ongoing national conflict. Finally, we do so from North African and Middle Eastern by highlighting the synagogue’s role as a countries, otherwise known as Mizrachi Jews stronghold, an angle which has thus far been (Chetrit 2010). This grouping has yet to be largely overlooked by the literature, which extensively discussed within the context of has focused primarily on Israeli synagogues Israel’s urban-religious configurations, partic- as places in which attendees negotiate their ularly in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian civic identity (Deshen 1972) and commemo- conflict (despite its crucial role in the forma- rate a shared ethnic origin (Leon 2010). tion of the latter). As part of its efforts to for- As we will show, the synagogue’s configura- tify the Jewish domination of the territory it tion within the formerly Palestinian built conquered during the 1948 war (Tzfadia & urban environment plays a dual role. First, it Yacobi 2011), Israel settled large numbers of is an attempt to claim (or, according to Jew- Mizrachi Jews in mixed cities whose Palestin- ish tradition and Zionist ideology, reclaim) ian population had either fled or been formerly Palestinian space within a broader expelled (Weiss 2011; Piroyanski 2014). This effort to achieve Jewish spatial domination in policy stemmed from the fact that as Jewish the city as part of a national conflict and an citizens of the state, Mizrachi communities urban struggle. Second, it serves to sustain were integrated into the body politic of the this claim by providing a place that enables country as part of its dominant majority. Jewish life. Tracing the way in which syna- However, at the same time, the Mizrachi gogue goers have restructured the institu- Jews’ cultural identity and political represen- tion’s role as a stronghold better enables us tation were suppressed by the hegemony of to question religion’s role in the city and the European Jews, who regarded Mizrachi com- ways in which urban dynamics affect and munal identity as backward and potentially rearrange the spatial production, communal dangerous, due to its common heritage with practices, and political functions of religion Arab culture (Chetrit 2010; Roby 2015). For in the urban context. these reasons, the primary venue through which Mizrachi Jews were able to articulate their cultural identity and communal herit- ENTERING THE STRONGHOLD: age was religion (which was also their main METHODOLOGY AND PRACTICE channel for expressing their affiliation with the Zionist project) (Bilu 2000; Yacobi 2008). Our research employed a mixed methods Synagogues received particular emphasis as approach based on two research strategies. a central locus of the Mizrachi community’s The first consisted of spatial analysis, urban organisational, economic, political, and spir- survey, and historical research, and was itual institutions, which continues to play a designed to assess the geographical spread central role in the communal and political and locations of Acre’s synagogues in an lives of many of these immigrant commun- effort to trace the sociological and historical ities (Deshen 1972; Leon 2010). The Mizra- elements of intercommunal tension in the chi synagogue, therefore, occupies a unique city. To this end, we mapped and docu- position within Israel’s urban environment. mented the currently existing synagogues On this basis, our contribution to the and analysed their locations vis-a-vis issues of scholarship is threefold. First, we seek to add internal ethnic migration and external migra- another layer of analysis to the study of reli- tion to the city. The second, which involved gion in cities by exploring the ways in which ethnographic research and included partici- religion shapes the urban sphere but is also pant observation of synagogue attendees and affected by it. Second, unlike other works residents of the neighbourhoods in which that have dealt with the configuration of the synagogues are located, was aimed at
VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG STRONGHOLDING THE SYNAGOGUE TO STRONGHOLD THE CITY 5 unravelling the intricate ways in which these synagogues are used and maintained by the communities who operate them. We were most interested in hearing the attendees’ urban narrative (Mohammad 2013) of the synagogue, reflecting the pro- cess through which their place of worship is continuously configured as a means of strongholding the city (Snyder 2011) and, more specifically, how the effort to maintain the synagogue reflected, in their view, the role of the synagogue as a key institution in the effort to safeguard the city’s urban Jewish identity. Participant observation was con- ducted by the male member of the two- person research team conducting the study, stemming from the synagogue’s core goal as a public space: that of assembling a sufficient number of Jewish men to form a minyan. Soon after commencing work on the project, we came to realise that our predominantly male informants felt more comfortable con- versing with a male researcher – regardless of his intentions for being there – primarily because he contributed to the overall effort to maintain the synagogue’s minyan.Aswe will see, it was during this complex process that the social and political attributes of the synagogue became most apparent.2
STRONGHOLDING ACRE IN THE NAME OF RELIGION: A SOCIOHISTORICAL ANALYSIS
It is a Sunday afternoon early in the month of May, and people are beginning to arrive at Keren Kedusha (Hebrew for ‘Sacred beam of light’) synagogue. The synagogue was orig- inally conceived as a house of prayer com- memorating the Tunisian Jewish heritage shared by the majority of its attendees. Figure 1. Map of Israel and the location of Acre [colour Today, the synagogue is hosting a gathering figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]. known as a Hilula (Hebrew for ‘celebration’), for which many of the synagogues’ attendees each worshipper is required to chant verses – consisting largely of Jewish residents from quietly to himself, silence envelops the hall, different ethnic backgrounds from all parts and open windows usher in the sounds of of Acre – have shown up with their families. cheerful voices emanating from the streets During the prayer service, some of the and the adjacent homes. We discern a laugh- attendees signal that it is too warm inside the ing voice and then become aware that we are synagogue and the windows are opened. listening to a conversation of a group of When the service reaches the point at which girls. It becomes clear that the everyday
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Figure 2. The pattern of demographic change in Acre, 1995–2008 [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]. conversation penetrating the place of wor- war, the city’s population absorbed a large ship is in Arabic and that its attendees are number of Palestinian refugees from the sur- visibly irritated. Every now and then, some- rounding areas, swelling to approximately one throws a glance toward the window, 35,000. Following the war, however, the which is typically disapproving. majority of Acre’s Palestinian community was In many ways, the scene of cheerful laugh- expelled (Abbasi 2010) and those who ter on one side of the divide and the scene remained congregated primarily in the old of aggravated glances on the other epito- city, which soon assumed the form of a mar- mises the experience of the city as a mixed ginalised urban ghetto (Waterman 1971). ethno-national environment in which the Israeli authorities regarded these residents street’s soundscape and the synagogue’s of Acre, like the other Palestinians who internal sphere are constantly interacting remained in the territory controlled by Israel with and reacting to one other. after 1948, as a potential threat. At the same The scenario also reflects Acre’s urban time, the city was repopulated by immigrants environment and is linked to the city’s his- primarily from North Africa and the Middle tory (Figure 1). Acre was once a central mari- East, who attributed great significance to time port of the Levant (Galili et al. 2010) establishing and maintaining synagogues and until the twentieth century remained (Torstrick 2000). The communal boundaries populated predominantly by Muslim and between Jews and Palestinians in Acre were Christian Palestinians, with a small Jewish clearly defined in 1948 and 1949, when most population (Philipp 1990). During the 1948 of the latter were concentrated in the walled
VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG STRONGHOLDING THE SYNAGOGUE TO STRONGHOLD THE CITY 7 old city and placed under strict military sur- response, in 2003, the Acre municipality veillance. In February 1951, the military gov- encouraged a Hesder yeshiva (a special frame- ernment which the state had imposed on work in which religious students engage in a Palestinians living within Acre’s old city was combination of advanced Talmudic studies terminated (Torstrick 2000) and the constant and military service in the Israeli armed marginalisation of this neighbourhood, in forces), to settle the neighbourhood with an which most of the city’s Palestinian popula- eye towards enabling the synagogue to begin tion was concentrated, sparked internal functioning again. In a sense, the strategy of immigration to other more developed parts the municipality was to safeguard the syna- of the city that were populated primarily by gogue in order to safeguard the Jewish iden- Jews (Garzuzi 2006). tity of the neighbourhood and the city as a By the end of the 1960s, the city had whole. begun to display signs of a slow and gradual This measure ultimately escalated into an resurgence of its Palestinian population open conflict between the new yeshiva stu- (Falah et al. 2000). Today, Acre is an ethno- dents and Wolfson’s Palestinian residents, nationally mixed urban locality with a who accused the former of harassing them population of 32,570 Israeli Jews and 14,301 on a daily basis. The students, along with Palestinian citizens of Israel (consisting of Wolfson’s remaining Jewish population, con- 12,885 Muslims and 1,416 Christians, CBS tended that the neighbourhood’s Palestinian 2011).3 Figure 2 illustrates the pattern of residents were creating a public nuisance by internal immigration from the old city in the using loudspeakers to announce the com- south to the neighbourhoods of northern mencement and conclusion of the daily fast Acre. Indeed, of all the mixed cities in Israel, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Acre has experienced the most significant In October 2006, violence erupted when the process of desegregation (Falah 1996). students turned the Jewish holiday of Suk- While living together in the same city, its koth into a demonstration of nationalist sen- two communities – the Jews (who until the timent by parading through the streets of the 1990s were mostly of Mizrachi origin) on the neighbourhood draped in Israeli flags (Tal one hand and the Palestinian residents of its 2006). This incident was quickly followed by walled quarter on the other hand – devel- several reports of arson attacks against syna- oped a strained relationship characterised by gogues and mosques in other parts of the tension and hostility. For the first few deca- city.4 des, the tensions that surfaced as a result of Two years later, in October 2008, sensitiv- the urban change in Acre were manifested ities surrounding Yom Kippur – the Jewish primarily in the portrayal of internal Palestin- Day of Atonement, which is widely consid- ian migration within the city as a national ered to be one of the most sacred days of threat to its Jewish character (Torstrick the Jewish year and on which, according to 2000). Beginning in the 1990s, however, the Jewish tradition, driving is severely frowned prevailing nationalist narrative was gradually upon – sparked a violent clash between Jews infused with religious tropes and themes, as and Arabs in the city. It began when a Pales- reflected in two primary developments. The tinian resident of Acre drove his car into a first revolved around the Wolfson neighbour- predominantly Jewish area of the city to pick hood, which was originally built to house a up his daughter, who was attending a family Jewish middle-class population but by the event there, and was pelted with stones 1980s had been largely populated by Palesti- thrown by Jewish residents of the neighbour- nians from the old city (Torstrick 2000). By hood. Rumours that the man had been killed the end of the 1990s, Wolfson was predomi- soon spread throughout Acre’s Arab neigh- nantly Palestinian in population (over 90%), bourhoods, leading to protest marches that and rumours quickly spread among the city’s quickly escalating into riots and violent Jews that the neighbourhood’s Palestinian clashes with the police (Shragai et al. 2008). residents were requesting that the local syna- Fearing that religious institutions would also gogue be converted into a mosque. In become targets of mutual attack by the two
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We were unable to obtain precise informa- tion regarding the exact number of syna- gogues in the city. One official attested to having counted at least 90 structures being used for this purpose, whereas an official list provided by the Acre Religious Council enumerated ‘only’ 63 registered synagogues (Figure 3).5 In contrast to this relatively high number, only seven mosques are operating in Acre today (Yaad 2008). Most of the mos- ques are historical buildings and began oper- ating prior to the establishment of Israel in 1948. A recent effort to reopen one of these mosques stirred vociferous resistance from Acre’s Jewish residents (Baranes 2011; Luz 2015). Synagogues, on the other hand, are a more common sight and can be found in most parts of the city. As the representative of the religious council explained to us, establishing a synagogue requires no act of compulsory registration.6 Indeed, one nota- ble attribute of most urban synagogues in the city is their administrative informality and lack of registration, despite their visible concrete presence in the urban landscape. Few synagogues are housed within structures Figure 3. Map of synagogues in Acre [Colour figure that were specifically designed to serve as can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]. such, and most operate in apartment build- communities, the Acre municipality stationed ings, commercial shops, or makeshift trailers. armed guards at synagogues and mosques, With the insight provided by our discussion against which random attacks were indeed thus far and better able to appreciate more subsequently perpetrated (Baranes 2008). fully how the situation depicted is symbolic These events exemplify the location of of this current moment of conflict and houses of prayers within the contentious change, we now return to the scene at Keren urban religious configuration of Acre and Kedusha synagogue with which we opened religion’s potential to impact the city’s built this section. The synagogue is located in an environment. Acre neighbourhood that was built during Religious institutions are often envisaged the four decades of British rule over Pales- as communal ‘bastions’ in changing urban tine (1918–48) and is situated adjacent to environments (Goh 2015), denoting an the old city (Waterman 1971), where Jews understanding of houses of prayer as con- and Palestinians live side by side. Between crete urban locations in which particular 1995 and 2008, the overall population of this 7 communities can shape, protect, and adapt area rose from 4,941 to 6,200. The Palestin- their particular collective identities in reac- ian population in the area rose from 1,635 tion to the changing dynamics of the urban (approximately 33% of the area’s population environment (Moffson 2003). In our case, in 1995) to 3,286 (about 53% in 2008), while the synagogue’s functionality as a stronghold the number of Jewish residents decreased derives from its role in the overall Jewish from 3,306 (approximately 67% of the area’s effort to render the urban space of Acre total population in 1995) to 1,635 (approxi- dominantly Jewish. mately 47% in 2008).
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Established by Jewish immigrants from than simply an achievement of religious valida- Tunisia in the 1950s, Keren Kedusha was tion; it has also emerged as a key element in the designed and decorated in large part in struggle for urban domination. accordance with the prevalent style and char- Ometz’s community outreach initiative has acter of Tunisian synagogues. The events and specifically targeted synagogues in an effort sermons conducted in the synagogue, how- to configure their religious activities into the ever, also emphasise the connection between everyday practices of Acre’s Jewish residents the synagogue and the city. This became and to bolster the city’s urban Jewish iden- especially evident to us one Friday morning tity.9 Despite being neither part of the origi- after the prayer service had ended, on a day nal founding members of the synagogue nor when a minyan had barely been reached. Few a Tunisian Jew, the rabbi comes to the syna- of the original founders remain, and the syn- gogue to give sermons and teach religious agogue now relies primarily on Jews who live classes aimed at attracting the city’s current in close proximity to the mixed neighbour- Jewish population. He also presides over vari- hood in which it is located. An elder ous celebrations, such as the aforementioned attendee by the name of Shlomo approaches Hillula. Rabbi Meir who presided over the service The interaction between the Rabbi and and apologises for the fact that a minyan was the community is part of the dynamic only reached at the very last moment. ‘I’m through which synagogues assume the form sorry’, he says and pauses, apparently think- of an urban stronghold by facilitating a col- ing about what to say next in order to justify lective claim to the city in the name of reli- the perceived failure: ‘this is Acre’. gion, while at the same time facilitating the Rabbi Meir is a young man who is part of continued practice of religious observance. ‘Ometz’ (Hebrew for courage), a civil society However, attendance is typically low despite organisation that has replaced the Hesder these efforts, reflecting the synagogue’s yeshiva in Wolfson, and is currently based in ongoing struggle to continue functioning as the latter’s synagogue. The organisation a house of prayer on a daily basis. As decided to relocate its activities to Acre dur- explained above, in order to worship regu- ing the 1990s in an effort to bolster the city’s larly as a public community, synagogues are Jewish identity as well as its Jewish popula- in constant need of enough Jewish men for a tion. It does so by sending rabbis to different minyan. And although Acre’s Jewish popula- synagogues in the city (not just Wolfson) in tion was significantly bolstered by the arrival order to generate social activity aimed at of immigrants from the former Soviet Union ‘raising the spirit’ of the synagogues. In the during the early 1990s, this population con- words of Rabbi Meir, ‘we came here because sisted primarily of non-observant Jews. As not Acre’s Jewish character is in danger. We want all of Acre’s Jewish residents attend syna- to make sure that this does not happen. One gogue on a daily basis, the struggle to con- of the ways to do this is by bringing the syna- vene a minyan has become a crucial element gogues back to life’.8 of maintaining synagogues as urban loci This perspective reflects a crucial element in through which faith can be sustained. the urban-religious configuration of the syna- The words ‘this is Acre’, uttered as an gogue to the city. Whereas these synagogues, as apologetic excuse by an older worshipper to urban institutions, are informal and flexible pla- a young rabbi who openly declares his aim of ces, they nonetheless possess a rigid religious using the synagogue to strengthen the Jewish code that determines their functionality. This hold on the city, reflects the synagogue’s code is based on two critical aspects: first, its abil- function as a stronghold and the effort to ity to form a minyan,which,asexplainedabove, stronghold the synagogue as a means of renders those in attendance a tzibur (a public strongholding the city. Put differently, ‘this is community); and second, the necessity of estab- Acre’, is a statement that speaks to a funda- lishing a synagogue anywhere that Jews live. In mental aspect of the synagogue’s configura- the context of the urban struggle in Acre, the tion within Acre as an important element of ability to successfully assemble a tzibur is more the city’s polarised power relations.
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The ability to assemble a minyan is central are inconsistent in their attendance and to understanding the urban aspect of the show up from time to time. This incidental synagogue’s formation as a stronghold, as attendance and the uncertainty it engenders the religious legitimacy provided by the syna- is a fundamental feature of Rakia Marom gogue becomes intertwined with the sociopo- and shapes the manner in which the syna- litical struggle over the city. More specifically, gogue operates on a social level. Every morn- the religious legitimacy acquired by making ing, the attendees struggle to assemble a the prayer ‘public’ becomes intertwined with minyan and convene a tzibur to engage in the broader struggle over the city’s identity public prayer. One morning, on a second as ‘Jewish’. The following section hones in consecutive day without a minyan, Yaakov and on this issue in particular by considering the Shmuel, both regulars, discuss the situation. significance of the minyan in the context of ‘If things continue like this for another these synagogues. week, no one will come’, complains Yaakov. ‘No one wants to be where there is no min- yan. The place is falling apart’. ‘IF WE’RE NOT HERE, HAMAS WILL BE The challenge of assembling a minyan is HERE’: STRONGHOLDING RELIGION also faced by Keren Kedusha, albeit in a less TO STRONGHOLD THE CITY critical manner, as a result of its hardcore group of approximately ten regulars who It is a bitter cold winter morning. The attend every prayer service. Still, as in the weather is wet and windy, and frequent show- case of Rakia Marom, the average age of the ers have turned Acre’s sidewalks into a slip- regulars at Keren Kedusha is approximately pery encounter for anyone attempting to go 65, and the size of the group is therefore somewhere faster than usual. A handful of expected to shrink in the years to come. men are hurriedly making their way to Rakia Here, in the context of age and place in the Marom synagogue, which was founded by Eli- city, the issue of absence assumes a different sha, who immigrated to the country from significance. It is this sense of absence that Morocco in 1960 and settled in Acre with his transforms the synagogue into a place that wife and their six children. When the state cannot be abandoned. began to build new apartment blocks in Acre Since the founding of the synagogue, the in the 1970s, Elisha bought one on a pre- demographics of the surrounding area have dominantly Jewish neighbourhood in north- changed significantly. It was originally popu- ern Acre. lated by Jewish immigrants, first from North Initially, Elisha assembled some of his Africa and later from the former Soviet neighbours, also mostly Moroccan immi- Union. However, since the mid-1990s, a grants, for prayer services in a nearby retire- growing number of primarily Muslim Pales- ment home. This space, however, ultimately tinian citizens of Israel have relocated there proved to be too far away from the homes of from other parts of the city and the sur- the worshippers. When Elisha petitioned the rounding area. Between 1995 and 2008, the authorities with a request for land to estab- overall population of the area decreased sig- lish a synagogue, he was instead advised to nificantly, from 17,356 to 12,800, reflecting a establish a provisional place of worship in substantial drop in the Jewish population, the bomb shelter of his apartment block. from 14,436 to 9,722. During the same Since early January, however, Elisha, who period, however, the Palestinian population can be characterised as physically fragile, has of the area increased from 2,544 to 3,078, stopped coming to morning prayers, as his resulting in a 10 per cent shift in the ratio health as deteriorated, preventing him from between Palestinian and Jewish residents descending the stairs to the synagogue. In (CBS 1995, 2008). Elisha’s absence, the synagogue has been in ‘If we’re not here, Hamas will be here’, a constant state of decline. Rakia Marom is a asserts Menachem – whom we previously wit- small institution with only four or five regu- nessed attempting to round up potential wor- lars attending prayers every morning. Others shippers for Shaharit by shouting up to their
VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG STRONGHOLDING THE SYNAGOGUE TO STRONGHOLD THE CITY 11 windows – after several weeks of struggling to have come since you left’, with ‘they’ refer- assemble a morning minyan: ‘we will never ring to Palestinian citizens of Acre. leave Acre’. While some would surely dismiss These vignettes reflect the tension between this view as hyperbole, it nonetheless reveals the location of the synagogue in a bomb the manner in which the synagogue’s activists shelter and its metaphorical formation as a regard it as a stronghold. stronghold. Indeed, the notion of the shelter Hamas is a militant Palestinian movement as a stronghold is also somewhat obfuscated that bases its agenda of national struggle on by its role as a place of hiding. The specific a religious platform (Mishal & Sela 2006). urban-religious configuration of the syna- When Menachem maintains that without the gogue in a mixed city such as Acre morphs it presence of the synagogue, Hamas would from a place of hiding into a site of taking a actually establish a presence in Acre in its stand and ‘speaking back’ to the city. stead, he is actually conflating the reason for continuing to struggle for the synagogue with the overall ethno-national conflict in CONCLUSION Israel in general and Acre in particular. From the perspective of attendees, the small This paper has considered one aspect of reli- makeshift synagogue operating in a bomb gion’s configuration into urban life in shelter is pivotal to a continued Jewish pres- response to the recent rapid demographic ence in the city and to the city’s identity as changes of ethno-nationally mixed cities. In Jewish. In a sense, assembling enough Jewish the case at hand, we analysed the dual pro- men ensures not only that the prayer will be cess of strongholding in the context of syna- deemed public but also that the city in which gogues in Israeli neighbourhoods in the it takes place will be considered Jewish in midst of significant demographic change. character. An insufficient number of men In his work on ‘enchanted geographies’, means that the prayer might not be Holloway (2006) focuses on the ways in ‘counted’, sparking the convergence of Jew- which spiritual spaces (specifically, seances in ish religious practice and the struggle to nineteenth-century England) are shaped by maintain a Jewish grasp on the city. the bodies that occupy them. In the case of This view was clearly articulated during a the synagogue, we observe this dynamic not memorial service for deceased relatives of only in the body’s positive role in the con- synagogue attendees (in this case, the family struction of the geography of religion but members of the deceased were for the most also in the role of its absence or lack. The part only occasional attendees of the syna- ability to render the synagogue a public gogue). Although this is a common element space is dependent on the materialisation of of worship in many synagogues, the shrink- ten male bodies, which is currently jeopar- ing number of participants means that dised by the declining health of the ageing memorial services in the Rakia Marom syna- worshippers and the gradual numerical gogue are rare. Only one memorial service decline of the local Jewish population. was held in the synagogue during our six In this way – and somewhat similar to months of fieldwork there. The male Gokarıksel’s€ (2009) analysis of Turkish women, attendee who requested the service was a for- veiling, and the urban public sphere – the mer resident of the neighbourhood who had notion of the synagogue as a stronghold is moved out of the neighbourhood to a differ- enforced through the dual process in which ent location in the city. After the service, he ‘religion is embodied and bodies are religioned’ remained to chat with the regular attendees, (Yorgason & della Dora 2009, p. 634): strong- and the conversation quickly turned to the holding the city depends on the ability to assem- neighbourhood’s changing demographics. ble a sufficient number of Jewish male bodies. Aaron, who regularly compares those who Hence, strongholding becomes a two layered fail to show up for prayer to AWOL soldiers, act: the establishment of the synagogue as a admonished the former attendee. ‘It is stronghold through the ability to assemble a suf- because you left!’ he told him bluntly. ‘They ficient number of Jewish men, which forms the
VC 2017 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG 12 MORIEL RAM & MEIRAV AHARON GUTMAN city as a Jewish stronghold within the overall con- protocol_search.aspx?ComId55 (accessed 1 April flict over space in Israel-Palestine. 2016) (Hebrew). By exploring the ways in which the house of 5. Interview with Moshe, a representative of the prayersoperatesasageopolitical stronghold, we Municipal Religious Council, 13 September gain a clearer understanding of how the city 2013 (conducted by the authors). shapes religious discourses, and not simply vice- 6. Interview with Moshe, a representative of the versa. Returning to the notion of urban- Municipal Religious Council, 13 September religious configuration, the very social structure 2013 (conducted by the authors). of the synagogue precludes worshippers from 7. By ‘area’, we mean the statistical urban area as forgetting the city – that is, the urban environ- demarcated by the Israeli Central Bureau of ment that provides the physical infrastructure Statistics. for a communal gathering that sustains the 8. Interview with Rabbi Meir, 27 October 2014 place of worship. While religion re-manifests (conducted by the authors). itself through the political conflict as a novel 9. Interview with Matanel, the co-ordinator of form of marginalisation aimed at the city’s Pales- Ometz in Acre, 2 December 2014 (conducted tinian population – that is to say, as a means of by the authors). claiming space at the expense of the city’s non- Jewish population – it is also a fundamental component of the Jewish immigrant’s urban REFERENCES identity. Strongholding the synagogue gives mean- ABBASI, M. (2010), The Fall of Acre in the 1948 ing to action, and action, in turn, constructs Palestine War. Journal of Palestine Studies 39, pp. new meaning for place. This process turns 6–27. the synagogue into a stronghold that lends ANDERSSON, J., R. VANDERBECK,G.VALENTINE,K. meaning to the relationship between the WARD &J.SADGROVE (2011), New York Encoun- religious and urban identity of the syna- ters: Religion, Sexuality, and the City. Environ- gogue attendees, enabling them not only to ment and Planning A 43, pp. 618 – 633. hold onto the city in the name of religion, BARANES, Y. (2008), Acre: Security Guards Were but to hold onto religion in the name of Posted at the Entrance of Mosques and Syna- the city. gogues. Mynet.Availableat
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