Maariv Junction, which connects Begin Avenue and Yitzhak Sadeh, Carlebach and Lincoln Streets [in Tel-Aviv] is one of the best known and busiest intersections in the country. Say, “Maariv Junction” and every Israeli will know where it is. Almost all the roads in Tel-Aviv lead from Maariv Junction and to Maariv Junction.

For decades, in full grandeur, on the corner of Begin Avenue and Carlebach Street, stood the expansive building that gave the junction the name of the newspaper published within its walls, and the adjacent Carlebach Street — which bears the name of the man who founded the paper and edited it in its first years, Ezriel Carlebach. A few weeks ago, workers climbed to the roof of the Maariv Building and uprooted the giant red letters that spelled its name. Now the building stands desolate, its entrance abandoned, its windows half opened, and some of its air conditioners removed. Thus passes the glory of the world.

Maariv, which until the 1970s printed the slogan, “the most widely read paper in the country,” on its first page, is now breathing its last breaths. If a last-minute miracle doesn’t happen, it will turn into the latest victim in the expanding cemetery where defunct Israeli newspapers are buried side by side.

It was on its deathbed for quite a long time, for long and agonizing years. Publishers came and went, and the newspaper gradually lost its status and its appeal. It seems that in the ruthless competition that developed over the heart and pocket of the Israeli reader, Maariv struggled to present a worthy alternative. Other newspapers reduced their format, went yellow, offered sparkly headlines, and marketed light news and gossip in an unrelenting attempt to win a place in the newspaper market. Only Maariv was notable for its conservatism and its desperate attempts to cling to the past.