commerce. Glass production and dye-making from marine snails were the city's most lucrative industries.
Crusader, Ayyubid and Mamluk rule
Prosperity ended in 1100, when Haifa was besieged and blockaded by the Crusaders and then conquered after a fierce battle with its Jewish and Muslim inhabitants. Under the Crusaders, Haifa was reduced to a small fishing and agricultural village. It was a part of the Principality of Galilee within the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Following their victory at the Battle of Hattin, Saladin's Ayyubid army captured Haifa in mid-July 1187. The Crusaders under Richard the Lionheart retook Haifa in 1191. The Carmelites established a church on Mount Carmel in the 12th century. Under Muslim rule, the building was turned into a mosque, later becoming a hospital. In the 19th century, it was restored as a Carmelite monastery over a cave associated with Elijah, the prophet.
The city's Crusader fortress was destroyed in 1187 by Saladin. In 1265, the army of Baibars the Mamluk captured Haifa, destroying its fortifications, which had been rebuilt by King Louis IX of France, as well as the majority of the city's homes to prevent the European Crusaders from returning. For much of their rule, the city was desolate in the Mamluk period between the 13th and 16th centuries. Information from this period is scarce. During Mamluk rule in the 14th century, al-Idrisi wrote that Haifa served as the port for Tiberias and featured a "fine harbor for the anchorage of galleys and other vessels.
Ottoman era
In 1596, Haifa appeared in Ottoman tax registers as being in the Nahiya of Sahil Atlit of the Liwa of Lajjun. It had a population of 32 Muslim households and paid taxes on wheat, barley, summer crops, olives, and goats or beehives.
Haifa was a hamlet of 250 inhabitants in 1764-5 that was located at Tell el-Semak, the site of ancient Sycaminum. Daher el-Omar, the Arab ruler of Acre and Galilee, moved the population
