I am not doubting that I might be wrong, but I am not clear what I am wrong about--Hava Nagila is in Ahava Raba, or Freygish, and my notes are right--and starting on E, there is no F# in it at all.

If it is the Hijaz makam you are talking about,the turkish makams technically have two names, one for each of pentachords--the scale we're discussing here is Hijaz Rast--the other, which is more or less the Miserlou scale, with the major 7th, is Hijaz Hijaz (except they spell it Hicaz, which I'm sure you know), though for some reason, the upper hijaz pentachord has a different intervalic structure than the lower one.   People call both makams Hijaz.

This is my side of it, at any rate--and I stick by it.