ch him. As soon as he saw him standing by himself, he went over to the baron to remind him who he was. "I remember," Rothschild said. "You are from that kibbutz [Jewish collective farm], from Sdot Yam." Haim was deeply hurt. "What kind of kibbutz?" he rails, 50 years on. "In my imagination I was actually the mayor of Paris."
Offended by what he saw as a rebuff by Rothschild, Haim determined that his ‘great city’ of Ashdod Yam would never again be mistaken for a mere kibbutz. The intensity of that affront gave him a sleepless night, he continues, and in the morning he went to see the interior minister, Haim Shapira. "How much is it going to cost me today?" the minister said as he entered, but Haim explained that it would cost nothing – all he wanted was to change the city’s name. The minister agreed, asking only that Haim get the authorization of the municipal council. Haim went into the next room, dictated a letter to the secretary and returned to the minister’s office. "Here is the authorization," he said.
Thus, he says, because of his wounded ego, the name of the city was changed. "What kind of Paris?" he chuckles about himself, looking back nearly half a century. "Even Tel Aviv was light-years away."
Haim strikes a serious note only when he talks about the character of the city. "This is a city that has never known ethnic discrimination," he asserts. "We did not have Ashkenazim and Sephardim [two types of Jews – European and non-European — which are given different statuses in Israel]. I erased that issue from the outset. That is what I drummed into their heads and that is the way it has stayed. We all became Ashdodis."
A Palestinian perspective:
A very different history is told by Abdullah Zaqut, who was a resident of Isdud village who was expelled in 1948. The great, multicultural city of Ashdod described by Haim, its first mayor, was for Palestinians who had lived there for centuries, a site of expulsion, pain, blood and tears — separation of families, curfews, martial law, imprisonment and forced removal.
"I was born in Isdud in 1923. Close to four thousand people lived there. I was born to a family of falahim [peasants], farmers. We had lands, vineyards, orchards. Isdud was one of the large villages. Close to 60,000 dunams. The residents lived off agriculture. During World War II they worked at the British army camps. A simple life. People were not hungry. There were many orchards and vineyards.
"At age 9 we went to school. I studied in Isdud for 5 years and in Majdal for 3 years and in Gaza two years. Afterwards I started instruction as a school teacher. I was a teacher in Isdud. Until 1948, Isdud was in the Palestinian part of the partition plan. The Egyptian army came. There was a war against the British army. At the end of 1948 the Egyptian army retreated. We remained in the village and we encouraged people to stay, we wanted to live with the Jews in coexistence. In Isdud there were about four thousand residents and more than 500 remained.
"The Israeli army came and enacted a curfew. Afterwards the military rulers came to look for planes that had fallen. The following day they told us to go out to the street. We didn’t think they would take us prisoner. The young people, above age 17, were taken prisoner. The elderly and the women were expelled to Majdal.
"After a few days the Israeli military leaders opened the way from Gaza to Majdal. At the end of 1948 there was no longer an Arab majority. The Israelis expelled us. But so that no one would say we were expelled, they said that the Arab armies had called the people to leave, and that’s not correct. They expelled us. They expelled me to Majdal. I was a teacher there. There was a military governor in Gadera, Zuckerman, who tried to help. People started to leave. At night there was a curfew. We lived in a ghetto. Go out to work with guards and return with guards. People worked, made a living. After three months they decided to expel the residents. The army would come at night to scare people. They gave money, bribes to people to sell belongings and move to Gaza