[1][2] During the initial Jewish immigration to Palestine, the business of maintaining orchards and exporting oranges was an integrated venture of Jews and Arabs based out of the Port of Jaffa.

[citation needed] Located at the crossroads between Africa, western Asia, and Europe, the Levant produced a number of commodities for export via imperial and global distribution networks throughout the late Ottoman period (1200–1900 CE).

[5] The citrus plantations of this time were primarily owned by wealthy Palestinian merchants and notables, rather than small farmers, as the fruits required large capital investments with no yield for several years.

In 1902, a study of the growth of the orange industry by officials outlined the different owners and their primary export markets as England, Turkey, Egypt and Austria-Hungary.

While the traditional Arabic cultivation methods were considered "primitive," an in-depth study of the financial expenditure involved reveals that they were ultimately more cost-efficient than the Zionist-Jewish enterprises that followed them some two decades later.

Jewish immigrants to the area, from 1917 called the British Mandate Palestine, introduced the advanced cultivation methods that spurred the Jaffa orange industry.

There is no doubt that the pitch of perfection to which the technique of plantation and cultivation of the orange and grapefruit have been brought in Palestine is due to the scientific methods of the Jewish agriculturist.

[15] Jaffa oranges are harvested in the Israel and the Palestinian territories between November and March, with the marketing season beginning in September and extending through April.

A general decline in the importance of agriculture to the Israeli economy, extreme limits on available water resources, and the reliance on migrant laborers have reduced productivity.

[17] Overshadowed by manufacturing industries, such as diamonds and precision instruments, Israel nonetheless continues to export a large number of citrus fruits to Europe.