History of Jerusalem

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This article chronicles the history of Jerusalem.

Contents 1 Antiquity (prehistory - 1000 BC) 2 Kingdom of Judah and Kingdom of Israel (1000 BC - 580 BC) 3 Restoration and autonomy in the Persian era ( - 312 BC) 4 Autonomy in the Greek era (312 BCE - 164 BCE) 5 The Hasmonean Kingdom and era (164 BC - 35 BC) 6 The Herodian Kingdom and era (35 BC - 96 AD) 7 Roman and Byzantine rule (6 AD - 638 AD) 8 Arab Caliphates and Christian Crusaders (638-1300s) 9 Mamluks and early Ottoman rule (1300s-1800s) 10 Late Ottoman period (1800s-1917) 11 British Mandate (1917-1948) 12 Division between Jordan and Israel (1948-1967) 13 Israel (since 1967) 14 Notes 15 References 16 External links

[edit] Antiquity (prehistory - 1000 BC)

The earliest traces of human occupation in Jerusalem go back to the late Chalcolithic Period and Early Bronze Age (c. 3000 BC). The Egyptian Execration Texts (c. 1900-1800 BC) and the Amarna letters (14th century BCE) show that the city was under the power of Ancient Egypt. In one of the Amarna letters the city's governor, Abdi-Heba, asks for help from Egypt to fight the Habiru (possibly identical to the Hebrews).

This city has known many wars, and various periods of occupation. According to Genesis 14:18, the city (named as Salem) was ruled by king Melchizedek, a priest of God. According to one Jewish tradition reported by the midrash, it was founded by Abraham's forefathers Shem and Eber, and some parts of the midrash equate Melchizedek with Shem.

Later, according to the Biblical narrative of the Books of Samuel, it was controlled by the Jebusites, a group that scholars generally believe to have been Hittite. It is probable that Melchizedek was himself a Jebusite; the -zedek part of the name occurring in other rulers such as Adonizedek, and in some biblical references to Jerusalem itself, such as neweh zedek (Jeremiah 31:23, where it is often translated as home of righteousness)^[1].

[edit] Kingdom of Judah and Kingdom of Israel (1000 BC - 580 BC)

According to the Books of Samuel, the Jebusites managed to resist attempts by the Israelites to capture the city, and by the time of King David were mocking such attempts, claiming that even the blind and lame could defeat the Israelite army. Nevertheless, the masoretic text for the Books of Samuel states that David managed to capture the city by stealth, sending his forces through a water shaft and attacking the city from the inside; archaeologists now view this as implausible as the Gihon spring - the only known location from which water shafts lead into the city - is now known to have been heavily defended (and hence an attack via this route would have been obvious rather than secretive). The Septuagint text, however, suggests that rather than by a water shaft, David's forces defeated the Jebusites by using daggers.

There was another king in Jerusalem, during, and possibly before, David's control of the city, according to the Biblical narrative: Araunah^[2], who was probably the Jebusite king of Jerusalem^[3]. The city, which at that point was upon Ophel, was, according to the biblical account, expanded to the south, and declared by David to be the capital city of the united Kingdom of Israel. David also, according to the Books of Samuel, constructed an altar at the location of a threshing floor he had purchased from Araunah; a portion of biblical scholars view this as an attempt by the narrative's author to give an Israelite foundation to a pre-existing sanctuary^[4].

Later, according to the biblical narrative, King Solomon built a more substantive temple - the Temple of Solomon, at a location which the Book of Chronicles equates with David's altar. The Temple became a major cultural centre in the region; eventually, particularly after religious reforms such as those of Hezekiah and of Josiah, the Jerusalem temple became the main place of worship, at the expense of other, formerly powerful, ritual centres, such as Shiloh and Bethel. Solomon is also described as having created several other important building works at Jerusalem, including the construction of his palace, and the construction of the Millo (the identity of which is somewhat controversial). However, archaeologists have found no major building works at Jerusalem dating from this era (except perhaps the Large Stone Structure, which is the subject of some controversy), and some have suggested that Solomon's building programme was somewhat mythical - being based on the building programme of the later Omrides^[5].

When the kingdom of Judah split from the larger kingdom of Israel (which the Bible places near the end of the reign of Solomon, though David Finkelstein and others claim it occurred closer to the time of Hezekiah^[6]), Jerusalem became the capital of the kingdom of Judah, while the truncated kingdom of Israel located its capital at Samaria.

By the end of this First Temple Period, Jerusalem was the sole acting religious shrine in the kingdom and a centre of regular pilgrimage; a fact which archaeologists generally view as being corroborated by the evidence, though there remained a more personal cult involving Asherah figures, which are found spread throughout the land right up to the end of this era^[7].

Jerusalem was the capital of the Kingdom of Judah for some 400 years. It had survived an Assyrian siege in 701 BCE by Sennacherib - unlike Samaria, the capital of the northern Kingdom of Israel, that had fallen some twenty years previously. According to the Bible this was a miraculous event in which an Angel killed 185,000 men in Sennacherib's army; according to Sennacherib's own account, recorded in an inscription contemporary with the event (known as the Taylor prism), the king of Judah - Hezekiah - was shut up in the city like a caged bird and eventually persuaded Sennacherib to leave by sending him 30 talents of gold and 800 talents of silver, and divers treasures, a rich and immense booty.

However, the city was overcome by the Babylonians in 597 BCE,^{[citation needed]} who then took the young king Jehoiachin into Babylonian captivity, together with most of the aristocracy. Zedekiah, who had been placed on the throne by Nebuchadnezzar (the Babylonian Emperor), rebelled, and Nebuchadnezzar, who at the time (587/586 BC) was ruler of the most powerful empire, recaptured the city, killed Zedekiah's descendants in front of him, and plucked out Zedekiah's eyes so that that would be the last thing he ever saw. The Babylonians then took Zedekiah into captivity, along with prominent members of Judah, The Babylonians then burnt the temple, destroyed the city's walls and appointed Gedaliah the son of Achikam as governor of Judah. After 52 days of rule, Yishmael son of Netaniah, a surviving descendant of Zedekiah encouraged by Baalis king of Ammon assassinated Gedaliah. The remaining population of Judah, fearing the vengeance of Nebuchadnezzar, fled to Egypt.

[edit] Restoration and autonomy in the Persian era ( - 312 BC)

After several decades of captivity in Babylon and the Persian conquest of Babylonia, Cyrus II of Persia allowed the Jews to return to Judah and rebuild the Temple. The construction was finished in 516 BCE the sixth year of Darius the Great. Then, Artaxerxes I sent Ezra and then Nehemiah to rebuild the city's walls and to govern Judah, which was ruled as a province under the Persians. The Temple was rebuilt and Jerusalem was once again the capital of Judah, and the center of Jewish worship.

[edit] Autonomy in the Greek era (312 BCE - 164 BCE)

When Alexander the Great conquered the Persian Empire, Jerusalem and Judea fell under Greek control and Hellenic influence. After the Wars of the Diadochi following Alexander's death, Jerusalem and Judea fell under Ptolemaic control under Ptolemy I. In 198 BC as a result of the Battle of Panium, Ptolemy V lost Jerusalem and Judea to the Seleucids under Antiochus the Great.

Under the Seleucids many Jews began to become Hellenised and with their assistance tried to Hellinize Jerusalem eventually culminating in a rebellion by Matisyahu the High Priest and his five sons; Simon, Yochanan, Eleazar, Jonathan and Judah the Maccabee. As a result of the rebellion Jerusalem became the capital of the independent Hasmonean Kingdom.

[edit] The Hasmonean Kingdom and era (164 BC - 35 BC)

The Hashmonean kingdom lasted for 103 years. It was ruled by Simon the son of Matisyahu; then his son Yochanan, then his son Yehuda Aristobolus, then his wife Salome Alexandra, then his brother Alexander Yannai then his sons Hyrcanus and Aristobulus. When the brothers Hyrcanus and Aristoblulus each asked for Rome to intervene on their behalf, Judea fell under the greater rule of Rome as an autonomous province but still with a significant amount of independence. The last Hashmonean king was Aristobulus's son Matisyahu Antigonus.

[edit] The Herodian Kingdom and era (35 BC - 96 AD)

The Romans installed Herod as a Jewish client king under Roman rule around 19 BCE. As king of Judea, Herod rebuilt the Second Temple and upgraded the surrounding complex. This rebuilding effort is considered the most important of the many improvements Herod made to the city. After Herod's death, the province of Judea and the city of Jerusalem came under direct Roman rule in 6 AD through Roman procurators; but Herod's descendants (in the order of Archelaus, Agrippa I and Agrippa II) remained kings of Judea until 96 AD, almost thirty years after the destruction of the Temple.

[edit] Roman and Byzantine rule (6 AD - 638 AD)

Jerusalem became the birthplace of Christianity in the first century AD. According to the New Testament, it is the location of both the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

After a brief period of Roman rule, the city was ruined when a civil war, accompanied by the Great Jewish Revolt against Rome in Judea, led to the city's sack yet again, at the hands of Titus in 70 CE. The Second Temple was burnt and all that remained was the great external (retaining) walls supporting the Esplanade on which the Temple had stood, a portion of which has become known as the Western Wall; also known as the Wailing Wall.

After the end of this first revolt, Jews continued to live in Jerusalem in significant numbers, and were allowed to practice their religion.

What is today known as "Old City" was laid out by the Roman Emperor Hadrian in the 2nd century, when he began to rebuild Jerusalem as a pagan city, Aelia Capitolina, in AD 135. He placed restrictions on some Jewish practices, which caused a revolt by the Judeans, led by Simon Bar Kokhba. Hadrian responded with overwhelming force, putting down the revolution, killing as many as a half million Jews, and resettling the city as a Roman colonia under the name Aelia Capitolina. Jews were forbidden to enter the city but for a single day of the year, Tisha B'Av, (the Ninth of Av, see Hebrew calendar), when they could mourn the destruction of their city at the Western Wall.

For the next 150 years, the city remained a relatively unimportant Roman town. The Byzantine Emperor Constantine, however, rebuilt Jerusalem as a Christian center of worship, building the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 335. Jews were still banned from the city, except during a brief period of Persian rule from 614-629 AD.

[edit] Arab Caliphates and Christian Crusaders (638-1300s)

Main article: History of Jerusalem (Middle Ages)

Although the Qur'an does not mention the name "Jerusalem", the hadith assert that it was from Jerusalem that Muhammad ascended to heaven in the Night Journey, or Isra and Miraj. The city was one of the Arab Caliphate's first conquests in 638 CE; according to Arab historians of the time, the Caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab personally went to the city to receive its submission, cleaning out and praying at the Temple Mount in the process. Sixty years later the Dome of the Rock was built, a structure enshrining a stone from which Muhammad is said to have ascended to heaven during the Isra. (Note that the octagonal and gold-sheeted Dome is not the same thing as the Al-Aqsa Mosque beside it, the latest version of which was built more than three centuries later). Umar ibn al-Khattab also allowed the Jews back into the city and freedom to live and worship after four hundred years.

Under the early centuries of Muslim rule, especially during the Umayyad (650-750) and Abbasid (750-969) dynasties, the city prospered; the geographers Ibn Hawqal and al-Istakhri (10th century) describe it as "the most fertile province of Palestine", while its native son the geographer al-Muqaddasi (born 946) devoted many pages to its praises in his most famous work, The Best Divisions in the Knowledge of the Climes. Jerusalem under Muslim rule did not achieve the political or cultural status enjoyed by the capitals Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo etc. Interestingly, al-Muqaddasi derives his name from the Arabic name for Jerusalem, Bayt al-Muqaddas, which is linguistically equivalent to the Hebrew Beit Ha-Mikdash, the Jewish Temple.

The early Arab period was also one of religious tolerance. However, in the early 11th century, the Egyptian Fatimid Caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah ordered the destruction of all churches and synagogues in Jerusalem, a policy reversed by his successors. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, revered by most Christians as the site of Christ's crucifixion and burial, was among the places of worship destroyed. Reports of this and the killing of Christian pilgrims were one cause of the First Crusade, which marched off from Europe to the area, and, on July 15, 1099, Christian soldiers took Jerusalem after a difficult one month siege. The Jews were among the most vigorous defenders of Jerusalem against the Crusaders. When the city fell, the Crusaders burned down the synagogue where the Jews had sought shelter.

Jerusalem became the capital of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Godfrey of Bouillon, was elected Lord of Jerusalem on July 22, 1099, but did not assume the royal crown and died a year later. ^[8] Barons offered the lordship of Jerusalem to Godfrey's brother Baldwin, Count of Edessa, who had himself crowned by the Patriarch Daimbert on Christmas day 1100 in the basilica of Bethlehem. ^[9]

Christian settlers from the West set about rebuilding the principal shrines associated with the life of Christ. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was ambitiously rebuilt as a great Romanesque church, and Muslim shrines on the Temple Mount (the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque) were converted for Christian purposes. It is during this period of Frankish occupation that the Military Orders of the Knights Hospitaller and the Knights Templar have their beginnings. Both grew out of the need to protect and care for the great influx of pilgrims travelling to Jerusalem in the twelfth century. The Kingdom of Jerusalem lasted until 1291; however, Jerusalem itself was recaptured by Saladin in 1187, who permitted worship of all religions (see Siege of Jerusalem (1187)).

According to Rabbi Elijah of Chelm, German Jews lived in Jerusalem during the 11th century. The story is told that a German-speaking Palestinian Jew saved the life of a young German man surnamed Dolberger. So when the knights of the First Crusade came to siege Jerusalem, one of Dolberger’s family members who was among them rescued Jews in Palestine and carried them back to Worms to repay the favor.^[10] Further evidence of German communities in the holy city comes in the form of halakic questions sent from Germany to Jerusalem during the second half of the eleventh century.^[11]

In 1173 Benjamin of Tudela visited Jerusalem. He described it as a small city full of Jacobites, Armenians, Greeks, and Georgians. Two hundred Jews dwelt in a corner of the city under the Tower of David.

In 1219 the walls of the city were razed by order of al-Mu'azzam, the Ayyubid sultan of Damascus. This rendered Jerusalem defenseless and dealt a heavy blow to the city's status.

In 1229, by treaty with Egypt's ruler al-Kamil, Jerusalem came into the hands of Frederick II of Germany. In 1239, after a ten-year truce expired, he began to rebuild the walls; but they were again demolished by an-Nasir Da'ud, the emir of Kerak, in the same year.

In 1243 Jerusalem came again into the power of the Christians, and the walls were repaired. The Khwarezmian Tatars took the city in 1244; and they in turn were driven out by the Egyptians in 1247. In 1260 the Tatars under Hulagu Khan engaged in raids into Palestine. It is unclear if the Mongols were ever in Jerusalem, as it was not seen as a settlement of strategic importance at the time. However, there are reports that some of the Jews that were in Jerusalem temporarily fled to neighboring villages.^{[citation needed]}

In 1267 Nahmanides (also known as Ramban) made aliyah. In the Old City he established the Ramban Synagogue, the oldest active synagogue in Jerusalem.

[edit] Mamluks and early Ottoman rule (1300s-1800s)

In the middle of the 13th century, Jerusalem was captured by the Egyptian Mamluks. In 1517, it was taken over by the Ottoman Empire and enjoyed a period of renewal and peace under Suleiman the Magnificent - including the rebuilding of magnificent walls of what is now known as the Old City (however, some of the wall foundations are remains of genuine antique walls). The rule of Suleiman and the following Ottoman Sultans brought an age of "religious peace"; Jew, Christian and Muslim enjoyed the freedom of religion the Ottomans granted them and it was possible to find a synagogue, a church and a mosque in the same street. The city remained open to all religions, although the empire's faulty management after Suleiman meant slow economical stagnation.

In 1482, the visiting Dominican priest Felix Fabri described Jerusalem as "a dwelling place of diverse nations of the world, and is, as it were, a collection of all manner of abominations". As "abominations" he listed Saracens, Greeks, Syrians, Jacobites, Abyssinians, Nestorians, Armenians, Gregorians, Maronites, Turcomans, Bedouins, Assassins, a possibly Druze sect, Mamluks, and "the most accursed of all", Jews. Only the Latin Christians "long with all their hearts for Christian princes to come and subject all the country to the authority of the Church of Rome". (A. Stewart, Palestine Pilgrims Text Society, Vol 9-10, p. 384-391)

In 1700, Judah he-Hasid led the largest organized group of Jewish immigrants to the Land of Israel in centuries. His disciples built the Hurba Synagogue, which served was the main synagogue in Jerusalem from the 16th century until 1948 (when it was destroyed by the Arab Legion).

[edit] Late Ottoman period (1800s-1917)

The modern history of Jerusalem began in the mid-nineteenth century, with the decline of the Ottoman Empire. At that time, the city was a backwater, with a population that did not exceed 8,000. Nevertheless, it was, even then, an extremely heterogeneous city because of its significance to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The population was divided into four major communities - Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Armenian - and the first three of these could be further divided into countless subgroups, based on precise religious affiliation or country of origin. An example of this would be the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which was meticulously partitioned between the Greek Orthodox, Catholic, Armenian, Coptic, and Ethiopian churches. Tensions between the groups ran so deep that the keys to the shrine were left with a 'neutral' Muslim family for safekeeping.

At that time, the communities were located mainly around their primary shrines. The Muslim community surrounded the Haram ash-Sharif or Temple Mount (northeast), the Christians lived mainly in the vicinity of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (northwest), the Jews lived mostly on the slope above the Western Wall (southeast), and the Armenians lived near the Zion Gate (southwest). In no way was this division exclusive, however, it did form the basis of the four quarters during the British Mandate period (1917-1948).

Several changes occurred in the mid-nineteenth century, which had long-lasting effects on the city: their implications can be felt today and lie at the root of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict over Jerusalem. The first of these was a trickle of Jewish immigrants from the Middle East and Eastern Europe. The first such immigrants were Orthodox Jews: some were elderly individuals, who came to die in Jerusalem and be buried on the Mount of Olives; others were students, who came with their families to await the coming of the Messiah, and adding new life to the local population. At the same time, European colonial powers also began seeking toeholds in the city, hoping to expand their influence pending the imminent collapse of the Ottoman Empire. This was also an age of Christian religious revival, and many churches sent missionaries to proselytize among the Muslim and especially the Jewish populations, believing that this would speed the Second Coming of Christ. Finally, the combination of European colonialism and religious zeal was expressed in a new scientific interest in the biblical lands in general and Jerusalem in particular. Archeological and other expeditions made some spectacular finds, which increased interest in Jerusalem even more.

By the 1860s, the city, with an area of only 1 square kilometer, was already overcrowded. Thus began the construction of the New City, the part of Jerusalem outside of the city walls. Seeking new areas to stake their claims, the Russian Orthodox Church began constructing a complex, now known as the Russian Compound, a few hundred meters from Jaffa Gate. The first attempt at residential settlement outside the walls of Jerusalem was begun by Jews, who built a small complex on the hill overlooking Zion Gate, across the Valley of Hinnom. This settlement, known as Mishkenot Sha’ananim, eventually flourished and set the precedent for other new communities to spring up to the west and north of the Old City. In time, as the communities grew and connected geographically, this became known as the New City.

[edit] British Mandate (1917-1948)

The British were victorious over the Turks in the Middle East during World War I and with victory in Palestine, General Sir Edmund Allenby, commander-in-chief of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force entered Jerusalem on foot, out of respect for the Holy City, on December 11th, 1917.

By the time General Allenby took Jerusalem from the Ottomans in 1917, the new city was a patchwork of neighborhoods and communities, each with a distinct ethnic character. This continued under British rule, as the New City of Jerusalem grew outside the old city walls and the Old City of Jerusalem gradually emerged as little more than an impoverished older neighborhood. One of the British bequests to the city was a town planning order requiring new buildings in the city to be faced with sandstone and thus preserving some of the overall look of the city, even as it grew. During the 1930s, two important new institutions, the Hadassah Medical Center and Hebrew University were founded in Jerusalem's Mount Scopus.

British rule marked a period of growing unrest. Arab resentment at British rule and the influx of Jewish immigrants (by 1948 one in six Jews in Palestine lived in Jerusalem) boiled over in anti-Jewish riots in Jerusalem in 1920, 1929, and the 1930s that caused significant damage and several deaths. The Jewish community organized self-defense forces in response to the Jerusalem pogrom of April, 1920 and later disturbances; while other Jewish groups carried out bombings and attacks against the British, especially in response to suspected complicity with the Arabs and restrictions on immigration during World War II imposed by the White Paper of 1939. The level of violence continued to escalate throughout the 1930s and 1940s. In July of 1946 members of the underground zionist group Irgun blew up a part of the King David Hotel, where the British forces were temporarily located, an act which led to the death of many civilians.

On November 29, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly approved a plan which partitioned the British Mandate of Palestine into two states: one Jewish and one Arab. Each state would be composed of three major sections, linked by extraterritorial crossroads, plus an Arab enclave at Jaffa. The Greater Jerusalem area would fall under international control. After partition, the fight for Jerusalem escalated, with heavy casualties among both fighters and civilians on the British, Jewish, and Arab sides. By the end of March, 1948, just before the British withdrawal, and with the British increasingly reluctant to intervene, the roads to Jerusalem were cut off by Arab irregulars, placing the Jewish population of the city under siege. The siege was eventually broken, though massacres of civilians occurred on both sides, before the 1948 Arab-Israeli War began with the end of the British Mandate in May of 1948.

[edit] Division between Jordan and Israel (1948-1967)

See also: Rule of the West Bank and East Jerusalem by Jordan

The United Nations proposed, in its 1947 plan for the partition of Palestine, for Jerusalem to be a city under international administration. The city was to be surrounded completely by the "Arab State", only a highway connected international Jerusalem to the "Jewish State".

Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Jerusalem was divided. The Western half of the New City became part of the newly formed state of Israel, while the eastern half, along with the Old City, was annexed by Jordan. According to David Guinn,

"Concerning Jewish holy sites, Jordan breached its commitment to appoint a committee to discuss, among other topics, free access of Jews to the holy sites under its jurisdiction, mainly in the Western Wall and the important Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives, as provided in the Article 8.2 of the Cease Fire Agreement between it and Israel dated April 3, 1949. Jordan permitted the paving of new roads in the cemetery, and tombstones were used for paving in Jordanian army camps. The Cave of Shimon the Just became a stable.^[12]

According to Gerald M. Steinberg, Jordan ransacked 57 ancient synagogues, libraries and centers of religious study in the Old City Of Jerusalem, 12 were totally and deliberately destroyed. Those that remained standing were defaced, used for housing of both people and animals. Appeals were made to the United Nations and in the international community to declare the Old City to be an 'open city' and stop this destruction, but there was no response. ^[13] (See also Hurva Synagogue)

It should be added, as noted by David Guinn,

"Similar to Jordan's treatment of Jewish holy sites, numerous Muslim holy sites (mosques and cemeteries) under Israeli rule in West Jerusalem fell into disuse and suffered from neglect. Some were destroyed due to Israeli development projects. For example, the Muslim cemetery in Mamilla area was damaged due to the construction of Independence Park in the center of Jerusalem...[O]ne justification that was offered [for the increasing demolition of mosques] was to "[spare] Arab citizens sorrow...".^[14]

On January 23, 1950 the Knesset passed a resolution that stated Jerusalem was the capital of Israel. It is also the largest city in the country.

[edit] Israel (since 1967)

East Jerusalem was captured by Israel Defense Force following the Six Day War in 1967. Most Jews celebrated the event as a liberation of the city; a new Israeli holiday was created, Jerusalem Day (Yom Yerushalayim), and the most popular secular Hebrew song, "Jerusalem of Gold" (Yerushalayim shel zahav), became popular in celebration. The Moroccan Quarter containing several hundred homes was demolished and their inhabitants were expelled. A public plaza was built in its place adjoining the Western Wall. However, the Waqf (Islamic trust) was granted administration of the Temple Mount and thereafter Jewish prayer on the site was prohibited by both Israeli and Waqf authorities.

Many large state gatherings of the State of Israel take place there now, including the official swearing-in of different Israel army officers units, national ceremonies such as memorial services for fallen Israeli soldiers on Yom Hazikaron, huge celebrations on Yom Ha'atzmaut (Israel Independence Day), huge gatherings of tens of thousands on Jewish religious holidays, and ongoing daily prayers by regular attendees. It is also a major high-point for tourists visiting Jerusalem.

Under Israeli control, members of all religions are largely granted access to their holy sites. The major exceptions being some security limitations placed on some Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip from accessing holy sites due to their inadmissibility to Jerusalem, as well as limitations on Jews from visiting the Temple Mount due to both politically motivated restrictions (where they are allowed to walk on the Mount in small groups, but are forbidden to pray or study while there) and religious edicts that forbid Jews from trespassing on what may be the site of the Holy of the Holies. Concerns have been raised about possible attacks on the al-Aqsa Mosque after a serious fire broke in the mosque in 1969 (started by Michael Dennis Rohan, an Australian fundamentalist Christian). Riots broke out following the opening of an exit in the Arab Quarter for the Western Wall Tunnel on the instructions of the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which prior Prime Minister Shimon Peres had instructed to be put on hold for the sake of peace (stating it has waited for over 1000 years, it could wait a few more).

Conversely, Israeli and other Jews have showed concerns over excavations being done by the Waqf on the Temple Mount that could harm Temple Relics, particularly excavations to the north of Solomon's Stables that were designed to create an emergency exit for them (having been pressured to do so by Israeli authorities). Some Jewish sources allege that the Waqf's excavations in Solomon's Stables also seriously harmed the Southern Wall; however an earthquake in 2004 that damaged the eastern wall could also be to blame.

The status of East Jerusalem remains a highly controversial issue. The international community does not recognize the annexation of the eastern part of the city, and most countries, including the US, maintain their embassies in Tel Aviv. The United States Congress has pledged to move its embassy to Jerusalem, subject to Presidential approval, which has not been forthcoming as the peace process continues. The United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 declared that the Knesset's 1980 "Jerusalem Law" declaring Jerusalem as Israel's "eternal and indivisible" capital was "null and void and must be rescinded forthwith". This resolution advised member states to withdraw their diplomatic representation from the city as a punitive measure. The council has also condemned Israeli settlement in territories captured in 1967, including East Jerusalem (see UNSCR 452, 465 and 741).

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

• Armstrong, Karen (1996). Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths. Random House. ISBN 0-679-43596-4.

[edit] External links

•   "Jerusalem (Before A.D. 71)". Catholic Encyclopedia. (1913). New York: Robert Appleton Company. 
• Jerusalem (71-1099) - Catholic Encyclopedia article
• Jerusalem, Latin Kingdom of (1099-1291) - Catholic Encyclopedia article
• Jerusalem (After 1291) - Catholic Encyclopedia article
• 4,000-year-old cemetery uncovered in Jerusalem (Nov. 8, 2006 )
• Jerusalem Through Coins