Jaffa Port 1

View looking north along the quay of the port of Jaffa.

Jaffa served as a port for over 4,000 years.  Because it is small, and because of the Kurkar reefs, large ocean-going vessels needed to anchor offshore and were served by small boats that brought goods and people into the harbor.

Logs from Lebanon were floated to Joppa and hauled to Jerusalem for the building of the Solomonic and Second Temples (2 Chron 2:16; Ezra 3:7).  In addition, Jonah boarded a ship bound for Tarshish from here.

The largest "natural" harbor of the country was at Acco/Ptolemais.  Today, Haifa and Ashdod serve as the major ports of Israel.