cross‐posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/3306020

The Transfer Agreements injected life into the Yishuv’s economy; the volume of imports, Trezib told Haaretz, was huge; in the 1933–1939 period this number doubled the export volume of the longer period of 1919 to 1933. The securities market, which had barely existed, also flourished.

[…]

Along with protests in the Yishuv in the '30s against the ties with the [German Fascists], the imports from [the Third Reich] created tensions because of the threat to manufacturers, both Jewish and Arab, in the small local market.

The book that accompanies the exhibition includes detailed information that tells a wealth of stories; for example, 15‐by‐15‐centimeter ceramic tiles made by Villeroy & Boch that were used by architect Dov Karmi at Liebling Haus on 29 Idelson St. in Tel Aviv, and on 126 Ahad Ha’am St. Cement was also imported from [the Third Reich] in exchange for oranges — which triggered a serious clash between the Jaffa citrus company and a British entity that controlled 75 percent of cement imports.

Meanwhile, foundry owner Alexander Kremener accused the representative of the Transfer Agreements in Palestine of badly harming his bathtub business; his products were slightly more expensive. Ironically, he had started his business thanks to the agreements when he immigrated from [the Third Reich] in 1933.

The textile industry also flourished because of the Transfer Agreements. A factory that was started by a Jewish family in Fulda, Germany was nationalized with the rise of [the Third Reich] and reestablished in the Yishuv. The factory made cleaning rags and later became the main textile supplier for hotels, hospitals and airlines in the country. The plant was about to be closed when designer Lou Moria came over and wove a large curtain there currently on display at the exhibition in Dessau.

The exhibition is located in a space that in the past was used for a Bauhaus school weaving workshop. One side of Moria’s curtain is a tribute to the modernist style in the spirit of Bauhaus, while the other side is in the Biedermeier style reminiscent of the Romantic interior design of the homes of German immigrants. The fabric in the exhibition is the last product created at the plant, which was bought by a Palestinian businessman from Jenin and moved to the West Bank.

[…]

Cohen‐Schneiderman says there’s something metaphorical about the fact that [Fascist]‐made materials are now being sent back to the country for the exhibition in Dessau. “We could only return pieces and fragments of the raw construction materials,” she says. Materials and construction waste that were taken from Liebling Haus when the building was renovated are now part of an archaeological display.

Also on display in Tel Aviv and Dessau are large photomontages by Azoulay of items discovered in the apartments in Liebling Haus, all of them made in [the Third Reich]. Or as Azoulay puts it, “We are revealing that most of Tel Aviv’s White City was actually built with Nazi raw materials and goods.”

(Emphasis added.)

Cheers to PalestineRemembered.com for showing me this.