Haifa is full of buildings designed in the international style, mainly concentrated in the Hadar Carmel neighborhood. One of these is Beit Asad Harfoosh located at 6 Shmariahu Levin Street.
Assad Khasfur?
We will state from the beginning that all our attempts to find information on the Internet about the man or his family have completely failed. From a review of the building permit from 1932, which is in the Haifa Municipality Archives, Asad Scarfoosh is the owner of the building. A reasonable assumption is that this is a wealthy Arab family (merchants?) that was able to finance the construction of a handsome apartment building that has been well preserved to this day.
We hereby address the readers of the section and ask for details about the man and thank you in advance for any help on the matter.
Beit Asad Harfoosh
This is a 3-story apartment building built in 1933 according to the plans of the architect Karl Roof, which we will detail later. The building is designed in the international style and bears its well-known characteristics: a symmetrical plan, balconies rounded at the edges, the window strips emphasize the horizontal lines of the building and these are interrupted by the vertical windows of the central stairwell. The finishing material of the building is the stone which appears in two different forms of work: embossed rough work ("Tubza") and fine work ("Messamm").
Karl Ruff, the designer of the building
the building architect, Carl Roof, was born in Haifa in 1904, to parents who were members of the Templar community that founded the German colony in the city. We note that the settlement of the Templars in Israel began in 1868, when a large group of members of the sect landed in the port of Haifa and decided to settle here. Most of them were engaged in agriculture and supporting professions and their beautiful houses along Ben Gurion Boulevard today testify to their economic prosperity. Their relations with the Jews and the Arabs were complex but reasonable.
July 1932
Everything changed in July 1932, when our friend, the young architect Karl Roff (28), received a directive from the German Nazi Party to found a Nazi party in Palestine. Karl Roof enthusiastically tied himself to the task and within a few weeks, the majority of the approximately 2500 Templars then living in Israel became supporters of the Nazi Party from the German homeland.
This is not the place to detail the complex history of the relations between the Templars, the Jews and the Arabs in Israel. But in conclusion, we will only note that the British deported most of the members of the community to Australia in 1941, because of their active support for Nazi Germany. The last Templars who were allowed to remain in Israel after the divorce, also left Israel, of their own accord, in 1950.
Dear readers,
The articles in this section are based on open information published in sources such as Wikipedia and other websites and may include various historical inaccuracies arising from the aforementioned sources.
Thanks for your response, I'll check the source again.
And a small correction: the name of the building is Beit Asad Harfush and not Hashfor. The name is also interesting and I wondered if there was a connection to the scarab
Wow! What a piece to discover this article.. I live in this house now!
The Templars harassed Jews, some did not trade with Jews. When they established bathing beaches in the Carmel Beach area, they forbade Jews to enter this beach. Only after Falahim shot one of them in the colony they were trying to establish in front of the Carmel Castle did they realize that they are not actually surrounded by cute friends but by people who are interested in stealing and robbing the crops and the houses they built. The gangs of Kfar Tira terrorized and therefore it was impossible to cultivate any land except for their incompetence in small and poor plots around Kfar Tira, which, with the level of crime and the vicissitudes of its inhabitants, certainly compared to Haifa and Acre - its name went far as a backward place full of highway robbers.
What is strange is that the Jews insist so strictly on preserving the legacy of these anti-Semitic Nazis, to the point that Tel Aviv is careful not to use the name Sharona in SH but in their distorted German pronunciation of the Sharon region. Weird and outrageous, but there are among us also converts of sorts and Hebrew-speaking auto-antisems, so perhaps we shouldn't be so surprised about their sympathy for the German Nazis.
thank you for your response. History is made of layers, for better or for worse. Along with the bad things, the Templars also did good things. We must know them all.
The Templars also lived in Zichron. Maybe they ran away there. Thanks for information.
Also in memory. Also in Bethlehem of Galilee. Also in Tel Aviv Sharona. Also in Haifa in the German colony
thank you for your response.
Professor Yossi Ben Artzi will surely be able to help with the information.
Thanks for your response, I will try to contact him.
Fascinating, also the addition in the comments. Thank you!
Thanks for the historical information.
Thanks so much for your response.
Blessings to Dr. David Bar On. Shalom and blessed Sabbath.
Thank you very much, friends Rafol, Shabbat Shalom.
In this house, at 6 Shmariahu Levin, on the second floor, she has lived since the end of the XNUMXth century
The thirties to the mid-sixties, the Amikam family.
Advocate Israel Amikam, my father, was one of the oldest lawyers in Haifa and there is a street named after him in Carmel. My mother, Tzipora Amikam,
Daughter of the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi in Haifa, Rabbi Baruch Marcus.
1905 to 1960. The building housed the offices of mature lawyers
The proximity of the building to the courts of that time. The landlord was
Mr. Sagan and all the apartments in the building had key fees.
thank you for your response. The very interesting information refers to a relatively late period. The enigma regarding Asad Khaspur still remains.
The office of the late attorney Zvi Hadassi was located in this building.
He was one of the commanders of the Echelon in Haifa, was banned in Beltron and exiled to Kenya. He was one of the commanders of Gilgil. He studied law there with Shamgar, Tamir and Milman. He was the head of the attorney's office in Haifa, the beloved of the profession and an honorary citizen of Haifa.
His name doesn't even have a symbol...
There is no doubt that he contributed more to Haifa than the Dodaim.
Conclusions There must be a lot on the subject!
How come the owner didn't turn himself in or did turn?
Apparently he was asked for cooperation at the time with enemy elements.
or did not return from Lebanon or another Arab country.
The structure must be confiscated and the value of the building must be reserved for the owner
when the time comes !
thank you for your response. The riddle concerning the owners of the building is not exempt.