The Battle for Silwan: Inventing the Palestinian History
Shaul Bartal
The August 26, 2010 a violent confrontation between Jewish and Arab residents of Silwan, a predominantly Muslim village on the outskirts of the southern tip of the walled Old City of Jerusalem broke. The name derives from the Biblical "Shiloah" [1] and subsequently greguizado "Siloam". [2]
In view of this, the fight that broke out in connection with an illegally built by Arab residents [3] door may seem a miniature version of the current conflict between Israelis and Palestinians regarding who controlled the Holy Land. However, reducing the struggle to a mere dispute over real estate, loses critical to understand the persistence of major conflict. Because of Silwan battle is a microcosm of a larger struggle in which one party, the Palestinians is clear the existence of the other - not only through the traditional armed conflict, but also rewriting history.
Erase the Past
The tactic of denying a Jewish past of the sites and holy places in the Land of Israel, is of relatively recent vintage in the Arab-Israeli conflict, but it has increased dramatically in recent years.
[However the Palestinian denial of the Jewish roots of Silwan, they are much more obvious to the casual observer, as you can see here, where Arab homes are literally built on ancient Jewish tombs carved into limestone hillside. ]
The Temple Mount in Jerusalem, where both the First and Second Temples were eight hundred years together, has now the Dome of the Rock Mosque of al Aqsa Mosque and the underground Solomon's Stables. Both in 1925 and again in 1950, the Supreme Muslim Council Palestinian acknowledged, unequivocally, the Jewish connection to the Haram al-Sharif (the Noble Sanctuary, that is, the Temple Mount), describing it as a sacred site for Jews in your own publication A Brief Guide to al-Haram al-Sharif:
Its identity with the site of Solomon's Temple is beyond dispute. This, too, is the spot, according to universal belief, on which 'David built there an altar to the Lord. " [4]
By the mid-1950s, this recognition had been terminated and, in 2001, the chief Muslim cleric of the Palestinian Authority (PA), the mufti of Jerusalem Ikrima Sabri, was able to declare: - "There is not [even] the most hint of the existence of a Jewish temple on this place in the past. Throughout the city, there is not a single stone indicating Jewish history. Our right [Muslim], however, is very clear. This place belongs to us from 1500 years ago. "[5]
The Western Wall, until recently the only visible vestige of the temple complex and the place where Jews have prayed for millennia, has been similarly disrupted. Muslims have changed the name of al-Buraq Wall, the place where the horse was tied at which it is attributed to the Prophet Muhammad had made his night flight to Jerusalem [6]. Palestinians continue to deny a Jewish connection, despite the likelihood that the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (r. 1520-1566) reaffirmed the right of Jews to pray at the wall [7], or three centuries later The Muslim ruler Ibrahim Pasha (son of the Viceroy of Egypt, Muhammad Ali) issued a decree regarding the site that allowed Jews to "visit as in the past." [8]
Even Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem has been under attack. For centuries a place of pilgrimage, especially for infertile Jewish women, is mentioned by the twelfth century Arab historian, al-Idrisi, and became a place of worship for Muslims also known as "Kubat Rahil". In 1615, Jews were given exclusive rights to the grave by his Muslim ruler, and again in 1830, the Ottomans recognized the legal rights of Jews to the site. A Sir Moses Montefiore was allowed to buy the site in 1841, at which time the tomb was restored and added a small prayer room for Muslims [9]. Since 1996, however, the Palestinians have taken to calling "Bilal bin Rabah Mosque", saying it is the burial place of the first servant of Muhammad [10], although there are centuries-old sites in Damascus [11] and Jordan for some time, they say the same. In 2010, the highly politicized organization, UNESCO, joined the Muslim deniers and demanded that Israel remove the grave of his National Heritage List and cede control to the Palestinians. [12]
The ultimate goal of the Palestinians and their allies is to promote the idea that Jerusalem in general, and neighborhoods like Silwan, in particular, have no Jewish ties. Therefore, the archaeological remains found in Jerusalem are presented as Canaanites or Muslims. As he argued Nazami Amin al-Ju'beh, chairman of the history department at the University of Bir Zeit:
"We do not agree with the biblical version, according to which there was a great kingdom or the capital of a great kingdom. Not found any castle or have found remains of the First Temple, which was supposedly built in the time of Solomon, who would witness this size ... The Jews came to Jerusalem in the first century BC and sovereignty over Jerusalem It lasted only a short time ... Until today, it is impossible to point to any property in Jerusalem that can be attributed historically this period. There is no historical characteristic related in this way to the Jewish culture. " [13]
Arab spokesmen from across the political spectrum and from many different fields, working with enthusiasm to deny any claim that recognizes archaeological link with the Jewish people of the periods of the First or Second Temple. This view resonates throughout the Palestinian spectrum, including popular television broadcasts and newspapers. For example, Amr Younes, president of Al-Quds Open University, noted the inaccuracy of the widespread view that the Palestinians originated from a group of people who emigrated from the Greek islands and settled in Palestine, claiming instead that Palestinians They are Arab Canaanites, natives of this land. [14]
On another occasion, he declared:
They excavated the Western Wall tunnel ... and in the heart of the tunnel, inaugurated a new synagogue, the closest - according to his dream - the holiest of the alleged temple. [15]
Yasser Arafat said at Camp David negotiations in July 2000 that the Jewish temple was not on the Temple Mount, saying the Koran showed that the temple was not even in Palestine. [16]
This method of erasing the Jews of Jerusalem is very popular in the Palestinian academia [17], among PA officials [18] and religious leaders [19] and has infected a whole generation of Muslims, both inside and outside the state of Israel.
Silwan and the City of David
Despite these strident fakes, there is no doubt that the Jewish people settled in Palestine long before the land that name before. In fact, the town of Silwan is, to some extent, the epicenter of that long history, which perhaps explains the ferocity of the current turmoil.
Many people assume, wrongly, that what today is called the "Old City" of Jerusalem is identical to the city taken by King David from the Jebusites (a Canaanite tribe), sometime in the eleventh century BC and subsequently converted the capital of the united Israelite kingdom. Indeed, there is abundant and growing evidence that the "City of David" was out of the present walls of Jerusalem, built on a rocky promontory which is now part of the village of Silwan. Excavations by European archaeologists in the nineteenth century and accelerated after the reconquest of Jerusalem by Israel in 1967, have revealed ancient and massive structures that were the original Jerusalem. Recent findings of seals and bullae (pieces of clay stamped with seal impressions) with Hebrew text, including at least two of the names of royal officials mentioned in the book of Jeremiah, have led the archaeologist Eilat Mazar to argue that parts of the site were the palaces of the Davidic kings and Judea. [20]
Both the City of David as the last stronghold of the Jebusites were provided with water from the nearby spring of Gihon, still a reliable source of water for the area. Even in ancient times, had dug a channel to a pool man-made, in order to store water in times of drought, which was the "pool Shelah (sent) to the Garden of the King" mentioned in Nehemiah, 3, 15. In response to the threat of siege by the Assyrian king Sennacherib, older aqueduct, outdoors, was plugged and King Hezekiah (c. 715-686 BC) dug a tunnel through the rock, from the source to the sink [21]. A Hebrew inscription testifies to this ancient engineering marvel, discovered in the late nineteenth century, and is now in the Museum of Istanbul [22]. The central area of the modern town of Silwan, seems to have been built on the nearby necropolis of the elite of Judea, as witnessed by about fifty graves found in the area.
After the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BC, and the return of exiles of Judea, the city grew significantly, but the renamed Siloam and surroundings were still integrally connected to it. They have been excavated massive steps leading up to the Second Temple, from the Shiloah (Siloam, Silwan), the great spring outside the city walls. Josephus, the Jewish historian of the first century, Siloam mentioned frequently, connecting the power source to the destruction of the Second Temple. According to him, before the arrival of Titus, the waters of Shiloah and other sources near the city fell. But for the time of Tito, the spring provided enough water to quench the thirst of the enemies of the Jews. The same phenomenon occurred before the destruction of the First Temple by the Babylonians, and Josephus used it in his attempt to convince the residents of Jerusalem to surrender. [23]
The story of Jesus and the blind [24] made the pool of Siloam a place of pilgrimage in the Byzantine period and the source of Uihon was, at some point, renamed "Fountain of the Virgin." The Church of Siloam, and the City of David / Wadi Hilweh section were within the walls of Jerusalem during the Byzantine period. Meanwhile, hermits and monks in charge of the tombs outside the walls were made and lived there, adding an extra layer of importance to the site for Christians. In the excavations of the city of David by modern archaeologists, were discovered remains of a church dating from the V century AD [25]. A map of 1917 shows still a church near the sink, a structure that probably , it was converted into the so-called Manantial Mosque, which was the subject of the fight above.
In 638 AD, Muslim armies of Umar ibn al-Khattab took over Jerusalem. Although discovered important remains dating back to the early Islamic period, they have not, in excavations in the City of David, the area seems to have become a Muslim district. Although today the locals stories circulated that the village had been established as "Khan Silowna" this conquering Caliph [26], the first reference of a Muslim author seems Ahsan al-fi al-Aqalim Taqasim Marifat (The Best Ways to Meet Geographic) Places of Muhammad al-Muqaddasi. Muqaddasi (945-1000 AD), a Jerusalemite, wrote:
Sulwan village is a place on the outskirts of the city. Below the town is Ain Sulwan [Spring of Siloam] pretty good water, watering large gardens, which were given in legacy [waqf] for the poor of the city by the Caliph Othman Ibn Affan. Lower down still, it is the Well of Job [Bir Ayyub]. It is said that at Night of Arafat, the holy well of Zamzam water in Makkah [Mecca], comes underground to the spring water [Siloam]. At night, people celebrate a festival here. [27]
Othman (or Uthman) Ibn Affan (579-656 AD) succeeded Umar as the third of the "righteous caliphs," a term given by Sunni Muslims Muhammad's immediate successors, indicating veneration of their actions and statements, It is extremely important for the conflict of today, like the legend recorded by Muqaddasi.
The fate of Silwan ranged over time. Muslim biographer and geographer al-Hamawi Yaqut, wrote in 1225 that "at the time was a considerable suburb in Sulwan, and gardens" [28], but less than a century later, the author of the Marasid a Gazetteer written around 1300 AD, stated that "the gardens were gone, the water was no longer Sulwan sweet, and that the buildings were in ruins." [29]
Closer to modern times, the Israeli geographer Menashe Harel, relates that in the mid-1850s, the Jews of Jerusalem were paid 100 pounds a year to the residents of Silwan, in an effort to prevent the desecration of the tombs near the Mount of Olives [30]. This strained relationship between the two communities took a new turn at the end of the century, with the arrival of Yemenite Jews to the city. Inspired by the messianic desire to return to the land of his ancestors, between 1881 and 1882, a group of poor Yemenite Jews arrived in Jerusalem. The, long, Jewish inhabitants of the city initially rejected their coreligionists but eventually built houses for them in the area of Silwan, creating a neighborhood that became known as Kfar Hashiloah (Shiloah Village) and "Yemenite Village". [31]
During the pogroms of 1921 and 1929, these houses were attacked by Arab neighbors and, in 1939, at the end of the Great Revolt of three years against the British Mandate authorities, the Yemeni Jews in Silwan were evacuated, their homes soon occupied without compensation for nearby settlers. Thus, both the area of the City of David and the neighboring town of Silwan had no Jewish residents until 1967.
The King's Garden
The City of David and the majority of the village of Silwan are built on two opposite slopes of the Judean hills, among which runs the Kidron Valley, named after the stream or wadi that runs by it to the Dead Sea ; water from the spring of Gihon derives essentially from the same source. As a result, this valley has been, since ancient times, more exuberant and more capable of sustaining agriculture limestone hills of the region. Known as the "King's Garden" in the Bible [32], is said to be the inspiration of verses from Ecclesiastes ("I became trees gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruits" [33]) and the Song of Songs, both traditionally attributed to the heir of David, King Solomon.
Be whoever they who originally cultivated area (and probably the Jebusites, before the Israelites also took advantage of its greenery), under Ottoman, British, Jordanian and Israeli control, the area remained indeed green. Since Israel reunited the eastern and western halves of the city, and given that Jerusalem has grown in population, the Muslim residents have moved illegally to the "King's Garden" and virtually erased his exuberant character.
On March 2, 2010, the Jerusalem Development Authority (ADJ), a joint-municipal government corporation under the authority of the Minister of Finance, Minister for Jerusalem Affairs and the Mayor of the city, presented a plan to rehabilitate the Garden of the King and provide the necessary infrastructure and other services to the center of Silwan. According to the promotional brochure ADJ,
The neighborhood of Silwan, lack of proper planning. This led to a situation in which the district has no infrastructure at all levels: educational facilities, roads, sidewalks, community facilities, open space recreation, electricity, water, parking, and other ... Under Ottoman, British control, Jordanian and Israeli, the [Garden of the King] was always zoned and preserved as a park. In the last fifty years, around 700 Muslim residents have moved into the area illegally. Because the current zoning still defines the area as a park, there is a similar lack of adequate infrastructure in the Garden of the King. [34]
The pamphlet continues:
Until 1967, the garden contained only four structures on the south side. However, the laying of sewage pipes led to the development of massive illegal construction in the area. Currently, there are eighty-eight structures within the garden area, all of which were built without construction permits, in an area that had been preserved as a garden [for] thousands of years.
The Silwan project would expand the boundaries of the National Park of the City of David [35] and, according to project plans, twenty-two of the eighty-eight illegally built homes are slated for destruction. the evicted families will be compensated, in addition to helping them rebuild their homes legally elsewhere in Silwan [36]. The rest of existing homes in the area will be approved retroactively and cease legal proceedings against them.
Thus, a restoration of the park would take place, both for residents and tourists, providing an economic stimulus for the entire neighborhood. Further, according to planners,
Currently, no public center serves residents of Silwan and the surrounding towns such as Abu Tor and Ras el-Amood with after school, library, programs for the elderly, kindergartens, child care centers or programs a public pool. Residents do not have access to these essential services provided to residents in other parts of the city.
The CCS [Silwan Community Center] will also focus on providing children of Silwan a new child care center ... day care center and seven classrooms for extracurricular activities programs. ...
For the growing urban population, the CCS has a special wing dedicated to programs for the elderly ... The roof of the CCS will have several public sports fields and a walk facing the Old City and the Temple Mount. [37]
This projected plan has touched Islamic and Palestinian organizations working in Jerusalem and, along with other groups have come out against this measure by the Israeli authorities. The mayor's office tried to compromise with residents of the area, offering the Arabs whose houses will be demolished, priority in the operation of tourism-related businesses in the park [38]. However, under pressure from the Obama administration and at the insistence of Prime Minister Netanyahu, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat, quickly it announced it would delay the implementation of the plan.
Complaints against the bill, however, includes not only legitimate complaints about the destruction of houses (illegally built) and the relocation of residents to another area. Along with these criticisms there are objections against the biblical and historical narrative that is at the base of the plan as well as a religious imperative no room for compromise.
"The Most Important Place in al-Quds"
However, the temporary suspension of Mayor Barkat Palestinian opponents continued their struggle against the plan. The Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Development Foundation - a non-profit organization associated with leaders of the Movement Israeli Arab Islamic, including Sheikh Raed Salah and the Neighborhood Committee of al-Bustan - a month later circulated an alternative plan the community, in which no housing would be evacuated or destroyed. [39]
While acknowledging that the houses of the Garden district of Rey / al-Bustan were built illegally, the authors upped the ante by stating that residents of the garden were actually refugees from the 1948 war that originally had been forced to move to the area of Maaleh Adumim in East Jerusalem. There they lived until they were forced to leave in 1967 to make way for the construction of the city of Ma'aleh Adumim. Then they settled in the area of Silwan and, over the years, built their houses in al-Bustan, without permission from the authorities. If the King's Garden plan were to go ahead, this would, in his narrative, his third expulsion.
Leaving aside questions of historicity of this claim, the brochure goes on to detail the Palestinian narrative of the site concerned. Under the subtitle "Silwan is the Most Important Place of Al-Quds, which was dedicated by the third Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan, the Just", he says:
The city has a well well known known as "Spring Silwan", which is connected to the history of Jerusalem. This water source was already established during the Canaanite period. The water was transported by gates that were built by the Jebusites [the original builders of Jerusalem], and today there are still archaeological remains demonstrating the existence [of the water system] ... The waters of spring water supplied to residents of the city during the Canaanite period.
The Canaanite Jerusalem depended on the waters of the spring to the Byzantine period. During the reign of Herod, he built a part of the pool of water from the spring, and this part of the spring waters was enough for him. During the Islamic period, Muslims by the Spring of Silwan were made, and the Just Third Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan, extended the spring, renewed it and dedicated Islamic dervishes in the same temple. From this period, the Fountain of Silwan and the surrounding region were defined as belonging to the Islamic Waqf [40].
With a slight nod to the universally maligned King Herod (74-3, 4 BCE), the committee deletes all other Silwan has links to Jewish history but, significantly, emphasizes the connection between the village, the waqf, and Caliph Uthman.
The word waqf, used above, has two interconnected meanings. It is both a Muslim religious attribute as a body that manages and monitors the legacy. The basic rules governing the waqf trusts are interpreted by the Sharia law but, in essence, the waqf property is absolutely permanent, and once established, the contract can not be altered or the property sold. Furthermore, linking the establishment of Silwan as waqf with Uthman, its existence as an eternal Muslim heritage makes it even more inviolable. Uthman, and the other three Righteous Caliphs were companions of Muhammad, so close to him in the Muslim discourse that his actions and words should be emulated, almost as much as those of Muhammad himself. If the Caliph Uthman devoted Silwan as a Muslim waqf, no Muslim can change that without being accused as an unbeliever. [41]
This topic is extended in the prospectus, when the authors write. During the second conquest of Jerusalem, [during the Salah ad-Din (Saladin) Yusuf ibn Ayyub [ie, Saladin] came and gave the village, inside which was the Spring, the madrassa [Islamic religious school] as-Salihiyya, and he returned and renewed the village and the spring as an Islamic waqf. This area was part of the Islamic waqf during the thousands of years since the conquest of Salah ad-Din. The spring is still under the supervision of waqf and is a source of income for the waqf. The inclusion in a list of the area as waqf was accepted only at the beginning of the nineteenth century. The list includes all revenues from every part of the land that is in Silwan, including the spring that is located in the village. [42]
It is logical that the figure of Saladin is presented to justify the Islamic belief in eternal property of Silwan, despite the absence of evidence, in medieval Arabic writings to testify to the narrative. When the ruler defeated the Crusaders and restored Jerusalem to Muslim control, Who better than he to return Silwan as waqf, fellow Muslims?
"Judaization" of Jerusalem
Admission to the appointment of Silwan as waqf could actually be a late episode in the history of the village, it does not reduce the belief in the sanctity of Silwan professed by them and by others. In fact, it goes hand in hand with a more pernicious myth: the alleged Jewish plan to "Judaize the holy city of Jerusalem" in order to transform it into "a Talmudic Jewish Jerusalem":
The municipality of East Jerusalem, is trying to continue his plan to test the existing reality according to the theories that appear in the Talmudic literature, although we are talking about Islamic holy Arab land and land. In order to achieve this, the city has created and inaugurated a Visitors Center of the City of David, which is part of the plan for the City of David. This is how began walking through the tunnel of the Spring of Silwan, walks ending in the pool of the fountain of Silwan, near the fountain of Silwan mosque. During the walk itself, visitors are accompanied by guides that expose Israeli legend of the City of David and the establishment of the First and Second Temples and the efforts to build [today] the Third Temple on the site of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque [43].
So, with the idea that the Jews invented its history and Silwan and its surroundings are a sacred waqf, opponents invent a conspiracy of Talmudic Judaization of the city, which aims to eradicate al-Aqsa Mosque to be replaced by a Third Temple. The trope of a perverted Talmudic Judaism is preferably used by anti-Semites throughout the centuries and most recently, picked up and amplified by Muslim and Arab opposition to Jewish state. [44]
In his obsession with the Judaization of Jerusalem, the authors of the pamphlet echo some of Sawt al-Haq wa-l-Huiriya (Voice of Truth and Freedom), 2006, the magazine of the Islamic Movement based are made Umm al-Fahm and directed by Raed Salah, where the plan to Judaize Silwan is discussed in great detail. The Islamic Movement, a local branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, is at the forefront of the organization of Israeli Arabs to identify strictly as Palestinians, Salah leading the campaign to "defend" Jerusalem and "release" of the "occupation "Israeli. [45]
The other image used by the Al-Quds Foundation is the Israeli alleged plot to replace al-Aqsa with a third temple - despite the fact that the Israeli authorities systematically have restricted the movement of non-Muslims on the Temple Mount, so much so that they have been accused of discrimination against Jews and Christians. [46]
A brochure of the Islamic group al-Jihad-Beit Makdas uses a melodramatic language to better illustrate the evil intentions of the Jews, accusing Zionists of attacking Jerusalem, Silwan - "the gateway to the al-Aqsa Mosque" - and al-Aqsa Mosque itself, which is "the rock of the grace of Jerusalem and the crown of the entire Islamic nation."
The authors acknowledge that "protect al-Aqsa and its gates and residents of the village of Silwan" and inform them that the way is clear "to the temple, from Silwan, aristocratic, the symbol of steadfastness, until gates of the al-Aqsa Mosque. " The authors ask "Would they want to be guardians [service] in the blessed Al-Aqsa and that nothing happens to them overlooked?" and warns, "Do not let that enter their homes flock of settlers". [47]
According to this line of thought, Silwan becomes the door by which the settlers are trying to move to Judaize Jerusalem and at the same time, enter the Temple Mount in order to dismantle al-Aqsa and rebuild the temple. The steps that are being carried out according to Islamic spokesmen, will lead to a third Intifada [48].
Conclusion
The Palestinian Arab attack on the Jewish connection to Jerusalem continues apace, with the help and complicity, not only radical Islamists or silwanitas angry, but fellow-travelers of the media and academia, including Jews Israelis.
Take into consideration the tours conducted by Emek Shaveh, an Israeli non-profit organization, and Palestinian residents of Silwan, with a vision of rejection of "political archeology of the Jews" and try the "true" meaning archeological area [49]. The founder of Emek Shaveh, Yonathan Mizrachi, who has voluntarily left his job at the Israel Antiquities Authority, spares no effort to downplay the Jewish Biblical history of the area. As he said: "After three hours [an Israeli organized] tour, you are convinced that you are in a site entirely Jewish in which the evidence of [civilizations] Canaanite, Byzantine, Muslim and, of course, Palestinian , they are neglected. Jerusalem has 4,000 years of history. They only focus on the wonderful stories of King Solomon, David, and Hezekiyah, of which, incidentally, have found no archaeological evidence that ties the place. " [50]
La página web de Mizrachi contiene un ensayo de más de 5.000 palabras - "Arqueología en Silwan" - que transforma la arqueología en una sirvienta de las devociones a las ciencias sociales y critica, incluso, el uso de la frase Ciudad de David como una manifestación de los objetivos de los colonos. Al hacerlo, también se las arregla para reescribir la historia, afirmando falsamente que "durante los principales periodos de prosperidad bajo el reino de Judea... la identidad cultural de la ciudad y sus habitantes fue impugnada". [51]
Lamentablemente, la batalla por Silwan (y por el tema más amplio del conflicto palestino-israelí) es probable que continúe, en tanto y en cluanto los árabes palestinos y sus hermanos se nieguen a reconocer que otro pueblo, los judíos, tiene derecho a la Tierra de Israel.
In view of this, the fight that broke out in connection with an illegally built by Arab residents [3] door may seem a miniature version of the current conflict between Israelis and Palestinians regarding who controlled the Holy Land. However, reducing the struggle to a mere dispute over real estate, loses critical to understand the persistence of major conflict. Because of Silwan battle is a microcosm of a larger struggle in which one party, the Palestinians is clear the existence of the other - not only through the traditional armed conflict, but also rewriting history.
Erase the Past
The tactic of denying a Jewish past of the sites and holy places in the Land of Israel, is of relatively recent vintage in the Arab-Israeli conflict, but it has increased dramatically in recent years.
[However the Palestinian denial of the Jewish roots of Silwan, they are much more obvious to the casual observer, as you can see here, where Arab homes are literally built on ancient Jewish tombs carved into limestone hillside. ]
The Temple Mount in Jerusalem, where both the First and Second Temples were eight hundred years together, has now the Dome of the Rock Mosque of al Aqsa Mosque and the underground Solomon's Stables. Both in 1925 and again in 1950, the Supreme Muslim Council Palestinian acknowledged, unequivocally, the Jewish connection to the Haram al-Sharif (the Noble Sanctuary, that is, the Temple Mount), describing it as a sacred site for Jews in your own publication A Brief Guide to al-Haram al-Sharif:
Its identity with the site of Solomon's Temple is beyond dispute. This, too, is the spot, according to universal belief, on which 'David built there an altar to the Lord. " [4]
By the mid-1950s, this recognition had been terminated and, in 2001, the chief Muslim cleric of the Palestinian Authority (PA), the mufti of Jerusalem Ikrima Sabri, was able to declare: - "There is not [even] the most hint of the existence of a Jewish temple on this place in the past. Throughout the city, there is not a single stone indicating Jewish history. Our right [Muslim], however, is very clear. This place belongs to us from 1500 years ago. "[5]
The Western Wall, until recently the only visible vestige of the temple complex and the place where Jews have prayed for millennia, has been similarly disrupted. Muslims have changed the name of al-Buraq Wall, the place where the horse was tied at which it is attributed to the Prophet Muhammad had made his night flight to Jerusalem [6]. Palestinians continue to deny a Jewish connection, despite the likelihood that the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (r. 1520-1566) reaffirmed the right of Jews to pray at the wall [7], or three centuries later The Muslim ruler Ibrahim Pasha (son of the Viceroy of Egypt, Muhammad Ali) issued a decree regarding the site that allowed Jews to "visit as in the past." [8]
Even Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem has been under attack. For centuries a place of pilgrimage, especially for infertile Jewish women, is mentioned by the twelfth century Arab historian, al-Idrisi, and became a place of worship for Muslims also known as "Kubat Rahil". In 1615, Jews were given exclusive rights to the grave by his Muslim ruler, and again in 1830, the Ottomans recognized the legal rights of Jews to the site. A Sir Moses Montefiore was allowed to buy the site in 1841, at which time the tomb was restored and added a small prayer room for Muslims [9]. Since 1996, however, the Palestinians have taken to calling "Bilal bin Rabah Mosque", saying it is the burial place of the first servant of Muhammad [10], although there are centuries-old sites in Damascus [11] and Jordan for some time, they say the same. In 2010, the highly politicized organization, UNESCO, joined the Muslim deniers and demanded that Israel remove the grave of his National Heritage List and cede control to the Palestinians. [12]
The ultimate goal of the Palestinians and their allies is to promote the idea that Jerusalem in general, and neighborhoods like Silwan, in particular, have no Jewish ties. Therefore, the archaeological remains found in Jerusalem are presented as Canaanites or Muslims. As he argued Nazami Amin al-Ju'beh, chairman of the history department at the University of Bir Zeit:
"We do not agree with the biblical version, according to which there was a great kingdom or the capital of a great kingdom. Not found any castle or have found remains of the First Temple, which was supposedly built in the time of Solomon, who would witness this size ... The Jews came to Jerusalem in the first century BC and sovereignty over Jerusalem It lasted only a short time ... Until today, it is impossible to point to any property in Jerusalem that can be attributed historically this period. There is no historical characteristic related in this way to the Jewish culture. " [13]
Arab spokesmen from across the political spectrum and from many different fields, working with enthusiasm to deny any claim that recognizes archaeological link with the Jewish people of the periods of the First or Second Temple. This view resonates throughout the Palestinian spectrum, including popular television broadcasts and newspapers. For example, Amr Younes, president of Al-Quds Open University, noted the inaccuracy of the widespread view that the Palestinians originated from a group of people who emigrated from the Greek islands and settled in Palestine, claiming instead that Palestinians They are Arab Canaanites, natives of this land. [14]
On another occasion, he declared:
They excavated the Western Wall tunnel ... and in the heart of the tunnel, inaugurated a new synagogue, the closest - according to his dream - the holiest of the alleged temple. [15]
Yasser Arafat said at Camp David negotiations in July 2000 that the Jewish temple was not on the Temple Mount, saying the Koran showed that the temple was not even in Palestine. [16]
This method of erasing the Jews of Jerusalem is very popular in the Palestinian academia [17], among PA officials [18] and religious leaders [19] and has infected a whole generation of Muslims, both inside and outside the state of Israel.
Silwan and the City of David
Despite these strident fakes, there is no doubt that the Jewish people settled in Palestine long before the land that name before. In fact, the town of Silwan is, to some extent, the epicenter of that long history, which perhaps explains the ferocity of the current turmoil.
Many people assume, wrongly, that what today is called the "Old City" of Jerusalem is identical to the city taken by King David from the Jebusites (a Canaanite tribe), sometime in the eleventh century BC and subsequently converted the capital of the united Israelite kingdom. Indeed, there is abundant and growing evidence that the "City of David" was out of the present walls of Jerusalem, built on a rocky promontory which is now part of the village of Silwan. Excavations by European archaeologists in the nineteenth century and accelerated after the reconquest of Jerusalem by Israel in 1967, have revealed ancient and massive structures that were the original Jerusalem. Recent findings of seals and bullae (pieces of clay stamped with seal impressions) with Hebrew text, including at least two of the names of royal officials mentioned in the book of Jeremiah, have led the archaeologist Eilat Mazar to argue that parts of the site were the palaces of the Davidic kings and Judea. [20]
Both the City of David as the last stronghold of the Jebusites were provided with water from the nearby spring of Gihon, still a reliable source of water for the area. Even in ancient times, had dug a channel to a pool man-made, in order to store water in times of drought, which was the "pool Shelah (sent) to the Garden of the King" mentioned in Nehemiah, 3, 15. In response to the threat of siege by the Assyrian king Sennacherib, older aqueduct, outdoors, was plugged and King Hezekiah (c. 715-686 BC) dug a tunnel through the rock, from the source to the sink [21]. A Hebrew inscription testifies to this ancient engineering marvel, discovered in the late nineteenth century, and is now in the Museum of Istanbul [22]. The central area of the modern town of Silwan, seems to have been built on the nearby necropolis of the elite of Judea, as witnessed by about fifty graves found in the area.
After the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BC, and the return of exiles of Judea, the city grew significantly, but the renamed Siloam and surroundings were still integrally connected to it. They have been excavated massive steps leading up to the Second Temple, from the Shiloah (Siloam, Silwan), the great spring outside the city walls. Josephus, the Jewish historian of the first century, Siloam mentioned frequently, connecting the power source to the destruction of the Second Temple. According to him, before the arrival of Titus, the waters of Shiloah and other sources near the city fell. But for the time of Tito, the spring provided enough water to quench the thirst of the enemies of the Jews. The same phenomenon occurred before the destruction of the First Temple by the Babylonians, and Josephus used it in his attempt to convince the residents of Jerusalem to surrender. [23]
The story of Jesus and the blind [24] made the pool of Siloam a place of pilgrimage in the Byzantine period and the source of Uihon was, at some point, renamed "Fountain of the Virgin." The Church of Siloam, and the City of David / Wadi Hilweh section were within the walls of Jerusalem during the Byzantine period. Meanwhile, hermits and monks in charge of the tombs outside the walls were made and lived there, adding an extra layer of importance to the site for Christians. In the excavations of the city of David by modern archaeologists, were discovered remains of a church dating from the V century AD [25]. A map of 1917 shows still a church near the sink, a structure that probably , it was converted into the so-called Manantial Mosque, which was the subject of the fight above.
In 638 AD, Muslim armies of Umar ibn al-Khattab took over Jerusalem. Although discovered important remains dating back to the early Islamic period, they have not, in excavations in the City of David, the area seems to have become a Muslim district. Although today the locals stories circulated that the village had been established as "Khan Silowna" this conquering Caliph [26], the first reference of a Muslim author seems Ahsan al-fi al-Aqalim Taqasim Marifat (The Best Ways to Meet Geographic) Places of Muhammad al-Muqaddasi. Muqaddasi (945-1000 AD), a Jerusalemite, wrote:
Sulwan village is a place on the outskirts of the city. Below the town is Ain Sulwan [Spring of Siloam] pretty good water, watering large gardens, which were given in legacy [waqf] for the poor of the city by the Caliph Othman Ibn Affan. Lower down still, it is the Well of Job [Bir Ayyub]. It is said that at Night of Arafat, the holy well of Zamzam water in Makkah [Mecca], comes underground to the spring water [Siloam]. At night, people celebrate a festival here. [27]
Othman (or Uthman) Ibn Affan (579-656 AD) succeeded Umar as the third of the "righteous caliphs," a term given by Sunni Muslims Muhammad's immediate successors, indicating veneration of their actions and statements, It is extremely important for the conflict of today, like the legend recorded by Muqaddasi.
The fate of Silwan ranged over time. Muslim biographer and geographer al-Hamawi Yaqut, wrote in 1225 that "at the time was a considerable suburb in Sulwan, and gardens" [28], but less than a century later, the author of the Marasid a Gazetteer written around 1300 AD, stated that "the gardens were gone, the water was no longer Sulwan sweet, and that the buildings were in ruins." [29]
Closer to modern times, the Israeli geographer Menashe Harel, relates that in the mid-1850s, the Jews of Jerusalem were paid 100 pounds a year to the residents of Silwan, in an effort to prevent the desecration of the tombs near the Mount of Olives [30]. This strained relationship between the two communities took a new turn at the end of the century, with the arrival of Yemenite Jews to the city. Inspired by the messianic desire to return to the land of his ancestors, between 1881 and 1882, a group of poor Yemenite Jews arrived in Jerusalem. The, long, Jewish inhabitants of the city initially rejected their coreligionists but eventually built houses for them in the area of Silwan, creating a neighborhood that became known as Kfar Hashiloah (Shiloah Village) and "Yemenite Village". [31]
During the pogroms of 1921 and 1929, these houses were attacked by Arab neighbors and, in 1939, at the end of the Great Revolt of three years against the British Mandate authorities, the Yemeni Jews in Silwan were evacuated, their homes soon occupied without compensation for nearby settlers. Thus, both the area of the City of David and the neighboring town of Silwan had no Jewish residents until 1967.
The King's Garden
The City of David and the majority of the village of Silwan are built on two opposite slopes of the Judean hills, among which runs the Kidron Valley, named after the stream or wadi that runs by it to the Dead Sea ; water from the spring of Gihon derives essentially from the same source. As a result, this valley has been, since ancient times, more exuberant and more capable of sustaining agriculture limestone hills of the region. Known as the "King's Garden" in the Bible [32], is said to be the inspiration of verses from Ecclesiastes ("I became trees gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruits" [33]) and the Song of Songs, both traditionally attributed to the heir of David, King Solomon.
Be whoever they who originally cultivated area (and probably the Jebusites, before the Israelites also took advantage of its greenery), under Ottoman, British, Jordanian and Israeli control, the area remained indeed green. Since Israel reunited the eastern and western halves of the city, and given that Jerusalem has grown in population, the Muslim residents have moved illegally to the "King's Garden" and virtually erased his exuberant character.
On March 2, 2010, the Jerusalem Development Authority (ADJ), a joint-municipal government corporation under the authority of the Minister of Finance, Minister for Jerusalem Affairs and the Mayor of the city, presented a plan to rehabilitate the Garden of the King and provide the necessary infrastructure and other services to the center of Silwan. According to the promotional brochure ADJ,
The neighborhood of Silwan, lack of proper planning. This led to a situation in which the district has no infrastructure at all levels: educational facilities, roads, sidewalks, community facilities, open space recreation, electricity, water, parking, and other ... Under Ottoman, British control, Jordanian and Israeli, the [Garden of the King] was always zoned and preserved as a park. In the last fifty years, around 700 Muslim residents have moved into the area illegally. Because the current zoning still defines the area as a park, there is a similar lack of adequate infrastructure in the Garden of the King. [34]
The pamphlet continues:
Until 1967, the garden contained only four structures on the south side. However, the laying of sewage pipes led to the development of massive illegal construction in the area. Currently, there are eighty-eight structures within the garden area, all of which were built without construction permits, in an area that had been preserved as a garden [for] thousands of years.
The Silwan project would expand the boundaries of the National Park of the City of David [35] and, according to project plans, twenty-two of the eighty-eight illegally built homes are slated for destruction. the evicted families will be compensated, in addition to helping them rebuild their homes legally elsewhere in Silwan [36]. The rest of existing homes in the area will be approved retroactively and cease legal proceedings against them.
Thus, a restoration of the park would take place, both for residents and tourists, providing an economic stimulus for the entire neighborhood. Further, according to planners,
Currently, no public center serves residents of Silwan and the surrounding towns such as Abu Tor and Ras el-Amood with after school, library, programs for the elderly, kindergartens, child care centers or programs a public pool. Residents do not have access to these essential services provided to residents in other parts of the city.
The CCS [Silwan Community Center] will also focus on providing children of Silwan a new child care center ... day care center and seven classrooms for extracurricular activities programs. ...
For the growing urban population, the CCS has a special wing dedicated to programs for the elderly ... The roof of the CCS will have several public sports fields and a walk facing the Old City and the Temple Mount. [37]
This projected plan has touched Islamic and Palestinian organizations working in Jerusalem and, along with other groups have come out against this measure by the Israeli authorities. The mayor's office tried to compromise with residents of the area, offering the Arabs whose houses will be demolished, priority in the operation of tourism-related businesses in the park [38]. However, under pressure from the Obama administration and at the insistence of Prime Minister Netanyahu, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat, quickly it announced it would delay the implementation of the plan.
Complaints against the bill, however, includes not only legitimate complaints about the destruction of houses (illegally built) and the relocation of residents to another area. Along with these criticisms there are objections against the biblical and historical narrative that is at the base of the plan as well as a religious imperative no room for compromise.
"The Most Important Place in al-Quds"
However, the temporary suspension of Mayor Barkat Palestinian opponents continued their struggle against the plan. The Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Development Foundation - a non-profit organization associated with leaders of the Movement Israeli Arab Islamic, including Sheikh Raed Salah and the Neighborhood Committee of al-Bustan - a month later circulated an alternative plan the community, in which no housing would be evacuated or destroyed. [39]
While acknowledging that the houses of the Garden district of Rey / al-Bustan were built illegally, the authors upped the ante by stating that residents of the garden were actually refugees from the 1948 war that originally had been forced to move to the area of Maaleh Adumim in East Jerusalem. There they lived until they were forced to leave in 1967 to make way for the construction of the city of Ma'aleh Adumim. Then they settled in the area of Silwan and, over the years, built their houses in al-Bustan, without permission from the authorities. If the King's Garden plan were to go ahead, this would, in his narrative, his third expulsion.
Leaving aside questions of historicity of this claim, the brochure goes on to detail the Palestinian narrative of the site concerned. Under the subtitle "Silwan is the Most Important Place of Al-Quds, which was dedicated by the third Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan, the Just", he says:
The city has a well well known known as "Spring Silwan", which is connected to the history of Jerusalem. This water source was already established during the Canaanite period. The water was transported by gates that were built by the Jebusites [the original builders of Jerusalem], and today there are still archaeological remains demonstrating the existence [of the water system] ... The waters of spring water supplied to residents of the city during the Canaanite period.
The Canaanite Jerusalem depended on the waters of the spring to the Byzantine period. During the reign of Herod, he built a part of the pool of water from the spring, and this part of the spring waters was enough for him. During the Islamic period, Muslims by the Spring of Silwan were made, and the Just Third Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan, extended the spring, renewed it and dedicated Islamic dervishes in the same temple. From this period, the Fountain of Silwan and the surrounding region were defined as belonging to the Islamic Waqf [40].
With a slight nod to the universally maligned King Herod (74-3, 4 BCE), the committee deletes all other Silwan has links to Jewish history but, significantly, emphasizes the connection between the village, the waqf, and Caliph Uthman.
The word waqf, used above, has two interconnected meanings. It is both a Muslim religious attribute as a body that manages and monitors the legacy. The basic rules governing the waqf trusts are interpreted by the Sharia law but, in essence, the waqf property is absolutely permanent, and once established, the contract can not be altered or the property sold. Furthermore, linking the establishment of Silwan as waqf with Uthman, its existence as an eternal Muslim heritage makes it even more inviolable. Uthman, and the other three Righteous Caliphs were companions of Muhammad, so close to him in the Muslim discourse that his actions and words should be emulated, almost as much as those of Muhammad himself. If the Caliph Uthman devoted Silwan as a Muslim waqf, no Muslim can change that without being accused as an unbeliever. [41]
This topic is extended in the prospectus, when the authors write. During the second conquest of Jerusalem, [during the Salah ad-Din (Saladin) Yusuf ibn Ayyub [ie, Saladin] came and gave the village, inside which was the Spring, the madrassa [Islamic religious school] as-Salihiyya, and he returned and renewed the village and the spring as an Islamic waqf. This area was part of the Islamic waqf during the thousands of years since the conquest of Salah ad-Din. The spring is still under the supervision of waqf and is a source of income for the waqf. The inclusion in a list of the area as waqf was accepted only at the beginning of the nineteenth century. The list includes all revenues from every part of the land that is in Silwan, including the spring that is located in the village. [42]
It is logical that the figure of Saladin is presented to justify the Islamic belief in eternal property of Silwan, despite the absence of evidence, in medieval Arabic writings to testify to the narrative. When the ruler defeated the Crusaders and restored Jerusalem to Muslim control, Who better than he to return Silwan as waqf, fellow Muslims?
"Judaization" of Jerusalem
Admission to the appointment of Silwan as waqf could actually be a late episode in the history of the village, it does not reduce the belief in the sanctity of Silwan professed by them and by others. In fact, it goes hand in hand with a more pernicious myth: the alleged Jewish plan to "Judaize the holy city of Jerusalem" in order to transform it into "a Talmudic Jewish Jerusalem":
The municipality of East Jerusalem, is trying to continue his plan to test the existing reality according to the theories that appear in the Talmudic literature, although we are talking about Islamic holy Arab land and land. In order to achieve this, the city has created and inaugurated a Visitors Center of the City of David, which is part of the plan for the City of David. This is how began walking through the tunnel of the Spring of Silwan, walks ending in the pool of the fountain of Silwan, near the fountain of Silwan mosque. During the walk itself, visitors are accompanied by guides that expose Israeli legend of the City of David and the establishment of the First and Second Temples and the efforts to build [today] the Third Temple on the site of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque [43].
So, with the idea that the Jews invented its history and Silwan and its surroundings are a sacred waqf, opponents invent a conspiracy of Talmudic Judaization of the city, which aims to eradicate al-Aqsa Mosque to be replaced by a Third Temple. The trope of a perverted Talmudic Judaism is preferably used by anti-Semites throughout the centuries and most recently, picked up and amplified by Muslim and Arab opposition to Jewish state. [44]
In his obsession with the Judaization of Jerusalem, the authors of the pamphlet echo some of Sawt al-Haq wa-l-Huiriya (Voice of Truth and Freedom), 2006, the magazine of the Islamic Movement based are made Umm al-Fahm and directed by Raed Salah, where the plan to Judaize Silwan is discussed in great detail. The Islamic Movement, a local branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, is at the forefront of the organization of Israeli Arabs to identify strictly as Palestinians, Salah leading the campaign to "defend" Jerusalem and "release" of the "occupation "Israeli. [45]
The other image used by the Al-Quds Foundation is the Israeli alleged plot to replace al-Aqsa with a third temple - despite the fact that the Israeli authorities systematically have restricted the movement of non-Muslims on the Temple Mount, so much so that they have been accused of discrimination against Jews and Christians. [46]
A brochure of the Islamic group al-Jihad-Beit Makdas uses a melodramatic language to better illustrate the evil intentions of the Jews, accusing Zionists of attacking Jerusalem, Silwan - "the gateway to the al-Aqsa Mosque" - and al-Aqsa Mosque itself, which is "the rock of the grace of Jerusalem and the crown of the entire Islamic nation."
The authors acknowledge that "protect al-Aqsa and its gates and residents of the village of Silwan" and inform them that the way is clear "to the temple, from Silwan, aristocratic, the symbol of steadfastness, until gates of the al-Aqsa Mosque. " The authors ask "Would they want to be guardians [service] in the blessed Al-Aqsa and that nothing happens to them overlooked?" and warns, "Do not let that enter their homes flock of settlers". [47]
According to this line of thought, Silwan becomes the door by which the settlers are trying to move to Judaize Jerusalem and at the same time, enter the Temple Mount in order to dismantle al-Aqsa and rebuild the temple. The steps that are being carried out according to Islamic spokesmen, will lead to a third Intifada [48].
Conclusion
The Palestinian Arab attack on the Jewish connection to Jerusalem continues apace, with the help and complicity, not only radical Islamists or silwanitas angry, but fellow-travelers of the media and academia, including Jews Israelis.
Take into consideration the tours conducted by Emek Shaveh, an Israeli non-profit organization, and Palestinian residents of Silwan, with a vision of rejection of "political archeology of the Jews" and try the "true" meaning archeological area [49]. The founder of Emek Shaveh, Yonathan Mizrachi, who has voluntarily left his job at the Israel Antiquities Authority, spares no effort to downplay the Jewish Biblical history of the area. As he said: "After three hours [an Israeli organized] tour, you are convinced that you are in a site entirely Jewish in which the evidence of [civilizations] Canaanite, Byzantine, Muslim and, of course, Palestinian , they are neglected. Jerusalem has 4,000 years of history. They only focus on the wonderful stories of King Solomon, David, and Hezekiyah, of which, incidentally, have found no archaeological evidence that ties the place. " [50]
La página web de Mizrachi contiene un ensayo de más de 5.000 palabras - "Arqueología en Silwan" - que transforma la arqueología en una sirvienta de las devociones a las ciencias sociales y critica, incluso, el uso de la frase Ciudad de David como una manifestación de los objetivos de los colonos. Al hacerlo, también se las arregla para reescribir la historia, afirmando falsamente que "durante los principales periodos de prosperidad bajo el reino de Judea... la identidad cultural de la ciudad y sus habitantes fue impugnada". [51]
Lamentablemente, la batalla por Silwan (y por el tema más amplio del conflicto palestino-israelí) es probable que continúe, en tanto y en cluanto los árabes palestinos y sus hermanos se nieguen a reconocer que otro pueblo, los judíos, tiene derecho a la Tierra de Israel.
Fuente: Middle East Quarterly/PorIsrael Traducido para porisrael.org por José Blumenfeld
[1] Isa 8:6; Neh 3:15.
[2] John 9:7, 11.
[3] The Jerusalem Post, Aug. 27, 2010.
[4] "A Brief Guide to Haram al-Sharif," Supreme Moslem Council, Jerusalem, 1925.
[5] Die Welt (Hamburg), Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Washington, DC, trans., Special Dispatch, no. 182, Jan. 26, 2001.
[6] See Daniel Pipes, "If I Forget Thee: Does Jerusalem Really Matter to Islam?" The New Republic, Apr. 28, 1997.
[7] Rivka Gonen, Contested Holiness (Jersey City: KTAV Publishing House, 2003), pp. 135–7.
[8] Eliel Löfgren, Charles Barde, and J. Van Kempen, "Report of the Commission appointed by His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with the approval of the Council of the League of Nations, to determine the rights and claims of Moslems and Jews in connection with the Western or Wailing Wall at Jerusalem," Dec. 1930, UNISPAL doc A/7057-S/8427, Feb. 23, 1968.
[9] YNet News (Tel Aviv), Nov. 3, 2010.
[10] Nadav Shragai, "Rachel's Tomb, a Jewish Holy Place, Was Never a Mosque," The Jerusalem Center for Public and State Affairs, Nov.-Dec. 2010.
[11] "Tomb of Bilal," IslamicLandmarks.com, accessed Mar. 12, 2012.
[12] "The Two Palestinian Sites of al-Haram al-Ibrahimi/Tomb of the Patriarchs in al-Khalil/Hebron and the Bilal Bin Rabah Mosque/Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem," 184 EX/37, United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization, Paris, Mar. 19, 2010.
[13] Fatah TV, Feb. 27, 2009.
[14] Al-Ayyam (Ramallah), Apr. 7, 2009.
[15] Palestinian Authority TV, May 1, 2009.
[16] Sari Nusseibeh and Anthony David, Hayo Hayta Aretz (Tel Aviv: Schocken Publishing House, 2008), p. 312.
[17] Marwan Abu Khalaf, Archaeological Center of al-Quds University, Jerusalem, interview, Palestinian Fatah TV, Feb. 27, 2009; Yonas Amar, Open al-Quds University, interview, al-Ayyam, Apr. 7, 2009; Hasan Sana-Allah, Center for Modern Research, Jerusalem, al-Ayyam, Apr. 28, 2009.
[18] Mahmoud al-Habash, Palestinian Authority agricultural minister, Palestinian Fatah TV, Apr. 16, 2009.
[19] Tayseer Rajab al-Tamimi, chairman, High Council of the Shari'a Court, al-Hayat al-Jadida, Mar. 2, 17, 2009.
[20] The New York Times, Aug. 5, 2005.
[21] II Kgs 20, 20; 2 Chron, 32, 3-4.
[22] Eyal Davidson, Yerushalaim Mikol Makom (Petach Tikva: Datiyur Publisher, 2003), pp. 30-1; Alon De Groot, "Jerusalem Waterfalls in the Days of the First Temple," Aidan, Jerusalem, 15, 1991, pp. 124-34; Roni Reich and Ali Shukrun, "The New Excavations in the City of David," in Avraham Faust and Eyal Baruch, eds., New Development in Jerusalem Studies, the Third Congress (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University, 2008), pp. 3-8.
[23] Yosef ben Matityahu (Josephus Titus Flavius), Toldot Milhemet Ha-Yehudim Im Ha-Romaim (Tel-Aviv: Modan Publishing House, 1996), book 5, p. 298.
[24] John 9:7, 11.
[25] "City of David," Conservation Dept., Israel Authorities Antiquities, Jerusalem, accessed Mar. 12, 2012.
[26] Jeffrey Yas, "(Re)designing the City of David: Landscape, Narrative and Archaeology in Silwan," The Jerusalem Quarterly, Winter 2000.
[27] Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Muqaddasi, Ahsan at-Taqasim fi Ma'rifat al-Aqalim (Leyden: EJ Brill, 1967), p. 171; Guy le Strange, Palestine under the Moslems: A Description of Syria and the Holy Land from AD 650 to 1500 (London: Alexander P. Watt for the Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1890), p. 221.
[28] Yakut Ibn Abdullah ar-Rumi al-Hamawi, Mu'jam al-Buldan (Leyden: EJ Brill, 1959), vol. 3, pp. 125, 761; Strange, Palestine under the Moslems, p. 221.
[29] Safi ad-Din Abd al-Mu'min Abd al-Haqq al-Baghdadi, Marasid al-Ittila ala Asma al-Amkina wa al-Biqa (Beirut: Dar al-Ma'rifa, 1954), vol. 2, p. 296; Strange, Palestine under the Moslems, p. 222.
[30] Menashe Harel, Golden Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Gefen Publishing House Ltd., 2004), p. 244.
[31] Tamar Wisemon, "Streetwise: Yemenite Steps," The Jerusalem Post Magazine, Feb. 28, 2008.
[32] II Kgs 25:4; Jer. 52:7; Neh 3:15.
[33] Eccles 2:5.
[34] "A Comprehensive Plan for Silwan: Development for Residents, Visitors and Tourists," Jerusalem Development Authority, p. 6, accessed Mar. 12, 2012.
[35] "Launch of the King's Garden Plan," The Jerusalem Development Authority and the City of Jerusalem, Mar. 2, 2010.
[36] Ha'aretz (Tel Aviv), June 30, 2010.
[37] "A Comprehensive Plan for Silwan, p. 20.
[38] Ha'aretz, Mar. 2, 2010.
[39] Silwan … Siraa Bekaa Wawagud, al-Quds Foundation for Development and the al-Bustan Neighborhood Committee, Silwan, Jerusalem, Apr. 2010, pp. 1-3, 7-19.
[40] Ibid., p. 5.
[41] Ephraim Herrera and Gideon Kressel, Jihad Ben Halacha le-Maase (Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense Publishing House and Kinneret Zmora Bitan, Dvir Publishing House, 2009), pp. 105-7.
[42] Silwan … Siraa Bekaa Wawagud, p. 5.
[43] Ibid., p. 6.
[44] Robert S. Wistrich, "Muslim Anti-Semitism: A Clear and Present Danger," The American Jewish Committee, 2002; al-Jami'a al-Islamiya, al-Mufawadat min Nuzur Islami (np), pp. 20-1; Muhammad Musbah Hamdan, al-Isti'mar wa-l-Sahyunia al-Alamia (Sidon: Dar al-Kutba al-Asriya, 1967), pp. 94-112.
[45] See Raphael Israeli, "The Islamic Movement in Israel," Jerusalem Letter, Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Oct. 15, 1999; L. Barkan, "The Islamic Movement in Israel: Switching Focus from Jerusalem to the Palestinian Cause," Inquiry & Analysis Series, report no. 628, Middle East Media Research Institute, Washington, DC, July 30, 2010.
[46] Arutz Sheva (Beit El and Petah Tikva), Feb. 16, 2012.
[47] "Al-Hay'a al-Islamiya al-Masihiya lenasra al-Quds wa-al-Maqdassat," Islamic Jihad-Bait al-Makdas, Dec. 2009, p. 8.
[48] See "Sarakha Tahdhir min Mukhatat 'Kedem Yerushalaim' Urshalim Awalan," al-Aqsa Foundation for Waqf and Heritage ad; Ibrahim Abu Jaber, "Mashari Ta'hid Madinat al-Quds wa-Fars Ishti'al Intifada Thalitha," Modern Learning Center ad, Mar. 4, 2010.
[49] "About Silwanic," Wadi Hilweh Information Center, Jerusalem, accessed Mar. 29, 2012.
[50] Aviv Lavi, "Ha-Politika shel Nikbat Ha-Shiloa'h," NRG (Maariv news website, Tel Aviv), July 27, 2009; Idan Landu, "Me-Nishul Mufrat le-Militsiot Mufratot," Haokets website, Nov. 25, 2010.
[51] Yonathan Mizrachi, "Where Is King David's Garden?" Emek Shaveh, Jerusalem, accessed Mar. 29, 2012.
Demolitions at center of battle over Jerusalem
An illegally built house that was demolished recently in Silwan, an Arab neighborhood in eastern Jerusalem, is one of 88 slated for destruction to make way for an archeological garden. (Dina Kraft)
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Deep in a valley below Jerusalem’s Old City, a narrow alleyway leads to the remains of three bulldozed Arab homes in an area slated to become an archeological park.
The homes, now just slabs of collapsed concrete, are in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan. Despite international protests — including from the U.S. secretary of state — the remaining 85 or so houses there, which were built without permits, are to be demolished to make room for a park the city hopes will be a major draw for tourists.
The dispute over the area, together with recent evictions in the Arab neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, are the most recent markers in the battle over Jerusalem. Israel seeks to cement its control over the city in part by altering the demographic character of its eastern, Arab neighborhoods.
“Our sovereignty over it cannot be challenged," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his Cabinet in July, in comments aimed at rebuffing U.S. criticism over plans for turning a hotel in Sheikh Jarrah into a Jewish housing project. "This means, inter alia, that residents of Jerusalem may purchase apartments in all parts of the city."
Critics claim the government is purposefully boosting the Jewish presence in traditionally Arab eastern Jerusalem, creating "facts on the ground" in order to make it difficult to ever divide Jerusalem as part of a two-state solution to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Palestinians demand eastern Jerusalem as part of a future Palestinian state.
But the Israeli government insists that a series of development plans for the city’s eastern part are not driven by a political agenda. The plans, in an area in and around the Old City called the Holy Basin because it is dotted with holy sites, call for more green space, better parking and repaved roads. Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah are both in that area.
"Government policy is governed by one overriding principle: that it is important to continue developing the city for benefit of all inhabitants of Jerusalem,” Netanyahu spokesman Mark Regev told JTA. "The position is that Jerusalem will remain a united capital and the government wants to see all its communities flourish."
Maher Hanoun sees things differently. He was evicted from his home in early August after the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that the land on which it was built belonged to Jews, according to documentation dating back to the Ottoman era.
Hanoun’s family, refugees from the fighting in Israel’s War of Independence in 1948, lived in a house built there by the United Nations in the 1950s, when the land was under Jordanian rule. Now homeless, Hanoun and his family have opted to stay on the sidewalk across from their old house, sleeping on mattresses and passing their days under the shade of a small olive tree.
"They want to destroy our homes and build apartments for settlers," Hanoun said.
The house’s new residents are Jewish. An armed guard watches the front gate, which is locked. A small Israeli flag flaps in the wind from the rooftop. Across an adjacent valley, more Israeli flags are visible on other homes.
Israel captured Eastern Jerusalem, along with the entire area known as the West Bank, in 1967 during the Six-Day War. When Israel later annexed eastern Jerusalem, the state offered Israeli citizenship to Arabs living there. Most refused, instead becoming permanent residents of the city with some of the same rights as Israelis, including Social Security payments.
The Jerusalem municipality says all eviction orders in Jerusalem are lawful, and that the law is applied to both Arab and Jew. But critics say evictions and demolitions are pursued aggressively in Arab parts of the city and only rarely in Jewish parts of the city, and that Arab Jerusalemites are forced to build illegally because their requests for building permits are regularly rejected.
"This is a proxy war carried out by the government of Israel by means of agents: the extreme right-wing groups active in east Jerusalem,” said Daniel Seidemann, founder of Ir Amim, an Israeli organization that advocates the equitable sharing of Jerusalem between Jews and Arabs. “Virtually every government organ from the Prime Minister’s Office on down is involved and the goal is, No. 1, territorial. This is a conscious effort to ring the historic basin with messianic settlements.”
The city rejects such charges.
"The mayor and the municipality apply the law equally,” Stephen Miller, a spokesman for Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat, said of demolition orders. “Anyone is free to build, expand and live as they desire as long as they follow the law.”
American Jews are among the main supporters of increasing the Jewish presence in eastern Jerusalem, donating $25.4 million over the past five years to purchase and build homes there, according IRS filings reported by Bloomberg News.
The City of David Foundation, which in recent years built an elaborate visitor’s center in Silwan where King David is believed to have laid the foundations for Jerusalem, is one of the Jewish groups involved in buying Arab homes in eastern Jerusalem. Known by its acronym, Elad, the group has helped settle 500 Jewish Israelis in those homes beginning in the 1990s.
"The City of David is not only a museum, in the sense that one feels the past; it is also the expression that the Jewish people have returned to their land," Doron Spielman, director of the foundation’s overseas division, wrote in an e-mail to JTA.
"One of our goals is to enable a thriving Jewish community to exist in the ancient City of David alongside our Arab neighbors,” he said. “The desire of Jews to buy land and live in the area is so high, and their Arab neighbors are at times willing to take advantage of the opportunity and purchase homes in another area of Jerusalem or outside the city."
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