On March 11, a photo of a newly renovated restaurant on HaAtzmaut Street in Haifa began circulating on social media. The sign read “Jafra Express" in English, with Arabic text beneath it. There was no Hebrew.
The post quickly gained traction, drawing tens of thousands of views. That same day, a complaint was filed with the Haifa Municipality by B’Tsalmo, an organization that advocates against incitement and any actions to harm the Jewish nature of the city. Within hours, city inspectors arrived at the restaurant and instructed that the sign be removed.
The sign came down that same day.
The speed of enforcement stood out. In the same area, there are numerous businesses with signage that does not include Hebrew at all. Walking along HaAtzmaut Street and nearby areas reveals English-only signs on hair salons, a bakery and coffee shop, an electronics store, and other small businesses. These are all long-standing small local businesses and not international brand-name stores. None of them had been required to take down their signs.
Jafra Express has operated in Haifa for several years. Owner Montasir Hamza renovated the premises before the war and the new sign was part of that renovation. He said that an application for a signage permit had been submitted, but when the war broke out and he had not yet heard back from the municipality, he put up the sign and re-opened for business.
The municipality, in a written response, says the application for a permit for the new sign was received only a few days ago.
Under Haifa’s municipal bylaw, Hebrew must appear on at least half the surface area of any business sign. The law does not prohibit additional languages, but it does require the presence of Hebrew. There are additional special requirements for the downtown area which is a historic conservation zone.
Hamza said he was not aware that the new sign would be considered a violation. “We operate according to the law," he said. “If the law requires Hebrew, we will add Hebrew. There was no intention to harm anyone." He was upset at B’Tsalmo’s accusation that the sign is part of a campaign "to prove Haifa is a Palestinian Arab city."
In their Facebook post published that evening, the restaurant rejected what it described as “incitement" and “lies," and emphasized that it has served “everyone-Jews and Arabs alike" over many years. “Our restaurant will remain a place that respects everyone," the management wrote.
A visit to the restaurant revealed that employees moved easily between Hebrew and Arabic and customers had English-, Russian-, and Amharic-accented Hebrew. Interestingly, their menu is only in Hebrew.
The removal of the sign unfolded against a broader backdrop.
On February 22, B’Tsalmo had submitted a complaint to the municipality regarding a publishing house on Khouri Street in Wadi Nisnas that is owned by Haifa city council member Raja Zaatra. The store has no regular sign, but the storefront window features painted imagery and a line from a poem by Mahmoud Darwish; the door has a painted map of "Palestine" that includes all of Israel. That complaint framed the issue not only as a violation of signage regulations but also as ideological incitement.
No enforcement action followed in that case, however.
On March 11, in a letter that included Jafra Express alongside its earlier complaint about the Khouri Street shop, B’Tsalmo again called for immediate enforcement.
In a statement, B’Tsalmo CEO Shai Glick wrote on WhatsApp:
"The reality in which Arab residents of Haifa deliberately choose to harm the Jewish national identity of the city by putting up signs only in Arabic is an outrageous and very serious phenomenon. The mayor of Haifa must ensure that the city truly remains one of coexistence."
This time, the municipality acted within hours.
That same day, members of the Hadash faction on the city council, including Raja Zaatra and Fakher Biadsy, submitted a formal query to the mayor. They raised concerns about selective enforcement, asking why businesses with signs in English or other languages had not been required to make changes, while enforcement appeared to focus on Arabic signage.
The query asked whether there was a defined enforcement policy, whether it was applied equally, and how decisions were made regarding inspections and removal orders. It also questioned whether procedures had been adapted to wartime conditions and whether similar policies were being applied in other mixed or multicultural cities.
The next day, Haifa Mayor Yona Yahav publicly addressed the issue in a Facebook post:
“There are too many signs that do not contain even one letter in the Hebrew language, and it is unacceptable to me that this should be so in the State of Israel - and not only because this is in violation of a municipal bylaw."
He wrote that he has instructed municipal departments to increase enforcement and indicated that compliance with signage requirements could be tied to business licensing.
This post drew hundreds of comments and dozens of shares. Many supported enforcement of Hebrew signage as a matter of national identity. Others pointed to what they saw as inconsistent application, citing English-only signs. A smaller number argued that Arabic signage reflects the city’s mixed character. In other words, the discussion covered broader questions of language, law, and identity.
The matter is straightforward legally: a municipal bylaw requires Hebrew on business signage, and a sign that does not meet that requirement may be subject to enforcement. However, when enforcement is not uniform - in fact, when it does not even take place until a sign with Arabic and no Hebrew is brought to the public’s attention, it compels discussion over language, identity, and public spaces.
The case of Jafra Express illustrates how a local regulatory issue can quickly become part of a broader public debate.
Ed. comment: Absolutely. However, while equal enforcement of the law is mandatory, and the requirement for signs containing Hebrew in the Jewish State is justified, there is another aspect to equating signs written only in Arabic with signs written only in English. In the case of the restaurant, BTsalmo seems to be mistaken regarding intent, but that is not necessarily the case in other establishments, and while no one thinks English signs signal that the UK or USA wish "to harm the Jewish national identity of the city," the Khouri Street publishing house shows that this intent exists all too clearly among some of the city's Arab citizenry. On the other hand, overreaction causes enmity and threatens coexistence, so that more discretion is required of B'tsalmo.