Jaffa

Jaffa is the ancient port district at the southern edge of Tel Aviv-Jaffa, Israel's largest metropolitan area. Settled for at least 4,000 years, it was one of the Mediterranean's principal ports before the modern state of Israel was established in 1948, when the city was merged with the newer Tel Aviv municipality. Today Jaffa retains a distinct Arab-majority neighbourhood character within the city and is a cultural and culinary destination.

On 8 June 2026, the Houthis (Ansar Allah) fired rockets toward the Jaffa and Tel Aviv area, the group's first strike on Israeli territory since the fragile April Ceasefire. The Houthis tied the move to Israeli operations in Gaza, Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran, and simultaneously declared a complete ban on Israeli maritime navigation in the Red Sea. The strike marked a resumption of the Houthi campaign against Israeli population centres that had paused under the April arrangement.

Tel Aviv-Jaffa is Israel's commercial and financial centre; the metropolitan area accounts for the majority of Israeli GDP. Rocket fire toward it carries both material and psychological weight disproportionate to the physical damage any individual salvo might cause. The simultaneous resumption of Houthi strikes and the Red Sea navigation ban placed two new pressure points on Israel on the same day its IDF was absorbing US criticism for the Karun petrochemical strike.