Theme Week Israel – Acre, the Crusaders City
Wednesday, 17 June 2015 - 10:18 pm (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination: Levant / Levante General , UNESCO World Heritage , Union for the Mediterranean
Reading Time: 3 minutes
Acre Sea Wall © Almog
🔊 Listen to this Post
Acre is a city in the northern coastal plain
region of northern Israel at the northern extremity of
Haifa Bay . Acre is one of the oldest continuously inhabited sites in the world. The population is at 46,000. Acre is a mixed city. Jewish Israelis live in the New City quarter, while Arab Israelis live in the Old City quarter. Acre is the most “oriental” city in Israel. In 2001, Acre’s Old City has been designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. Acre is the holiest city of the
Bahá’í Faith .
Historically, it was a strategic coastal link to the Levant . In crusader times it was known as St. John d’Acre after the Knights Hospitaller of St John order who had their headquarters there, founded by German merchants from Lübeck and Bremen . The seat of the order’s Grand Master remained in Acre until 1291, when it was relocated to Venice .
Knight's Hall © Ian and Wendy Sewell - ww.ianandwendy.com/cc-by-sa-3.0
In the 1990s the city absorbed thousands of Jews, who immigrated from the Soviet Union and later from Russia and Ukraine. Within several years, however, the population balance between Jews and Arabs, as northern neighbourhoods were abandoned by many of its Jewish residents in favour of new housing projects in nearby Nahariya, while many Muslim Arabs moved in, largely coming from nearby Arab villages. Arab Israelis are living in the Old Town, while the Jewish Israelies live in the surrounding neighborhoods. Acre is the most oriental town of Israel.
Today, the city, which was for centuries a major port city in the eastern Mediterranean, has lost much of its importance. Industry is of economic significance, especially the iron processing.
Here you can find the complete
Overview of all Theme Weeks .
Read more on
Akko ,
Wikivoyage Akko and
Wikipedia Acre . Learn more about the
use of photos . To inform you about latest news most of the city, town or tourism websites offer a newsletter service and/or operate Facebook pages/Twitter accounts. In addition more and more destinations, tourist organizations and cultural institutions offer Apps for your Smart Phone or Tablet, to provide you with a mobile tourist guide (
Smart Traveler App by U.S. Department of State -
Weather report by weather.com -
Global Passport Power Rank -
Travel Risk Map -
Democracy Index -
GDP according to IMF, UN, and World Bank -
Global Competitiveness Report -
Corruption Perceptions Index -
Press Freedom Index -
World Justice Project - Rule of Law Index -
UN Human Development Index -
Global Peace Index -
Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index ). If you have a suggestion, critique, review or comment to this blog entry, we are looking forward to receive your e-mail at
comment@wingsch.net . Please name the headline of the blog post to which your e-mail refers to in the subject line.
Recommended posts:
[caption id="attachment_225892" align="aligncenter" width="472"] Ernest Hemingway at the Sun Valley Lodge, Idaho, 1939 © Lloyd Arnold - www.phoodie.info[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American novelist, short-story writer, journalist, and sportsman. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his adventurous lifestyle and his public image brought him admiration from later generations. Hemingway produced most of his wo...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_4617" align="aligncenter" width="590" caption="© Mbaeckmann / Thomas doerfer"][/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions (SARs) of the People's Republic of China, the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour. With a land mass of 1,104 km2 (426 sq mi) and a population of seven million people, Hong Kong is one of the most ...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_153585" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Verona Collage © DanieleDF1995[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Verona is a city in the Veneto, northern Italy, with approx. 265,000 inhabitants and one of the seven chef-lieus of the region. It is the second largest city municipality in the region and the third of northeast Italy. The metropolitan area of Verona covers an area of 1,426 km² (550.58 sq mi) and has a population of 714,274 inhabitants. It is one of the main tourist destinations in northern Italy, owing to ...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_225194" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Holy Island © flickr.com - Chris Combe/cc-by-2.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Lindisfarne, also called Holy Island, is a tidal island off the northeast coast of England, which constitutes the civil parish of Holy Island in Northumberland. Holy Island has a recorded history from the 6th century AD; it was an important centre of Celtic Christianity under Saints Aidan of Lindisfarne, Cuthbert, Eadfrith of Lindisfarne and Eadberht of Lindisfarne. After the Viking invasio...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_27443" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © Therme Erding/cc-by-sa-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Therme Erding is the largest thermal bath complex in Europe at 145,000 square metres (36 acres). It is 30 minutes northeast of Munich by car and is visited by around 4000 people every day. On 12 February 1983, the American oil company Texaco drilled 2,350 metres (7,710 ft) below ground, just outside the town of Erding, Bavaria, Germany. Instead of oil, they discovered sulphorous water. Initially a 'mini thermal...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_216960" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Shabbat Square © Djampa/cc-by-sa-4.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Mea Shearim ("hundred gates"; contextually, "a hundred fold") is one of the oldest Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem. It is populated by Haredi Jews, and was built by members of the Old Yishuv. The oldest Sephardic Haredi dynasty, Levi Kahana of Spain, has a religious cultural center in the neighborhood. The name Mea Shearim is derived from a verse from Genesis, which happened to be part of the weekly ...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_193057" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © Maurice07/cc-by-sa-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Istanbul Cevahir Shopping and Entertainment Centre, also known as Şişli Kültür ve Ticaret Merkezi (Şişli Culture and Trade Centre) is a modern shopping mall located on the Büyükdere Avenue in the Şişli district of Istanbul. Opened on 15 October 2005, Istanbul Cevahir was the largest shopping mall in Europe in terms of gross leasable area between 2005 and 2011, and is one of the largest in the world.
...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_227102" align="aligncenter" width="590"] First oil shale lot © Aleksandr Matrunich/cc-by-sa-4.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Kohtla-Järve is a city and municipality in north-eastern Estonia, founded in 1924 and incorporated as a town in 1946. The city is highly industrial, and is both a processor of oil shales and is a large producer of various petroleum products. The city is also very diverse ethnically: it contains people of over 40 ethnic groups Only 21% of the population are ethnic Estonians; most of t...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_160581" align="aligncenter" width="590"] Sandringham House © geograph.org.uk - Elwyn Thomas Roddick[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Sandringham House is a country house on 8,000 hectares (20,000 acres) of land near the village of Sandringham in Norfolk, England. The house is privately owned by the British Royal Family and is located on the royal Sandringham Estate, which lies within the Norfolk Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The house was first opened to the public in 1977, and there is a museum wit...
[ read more ]
[caption id="attachment_240018" align="aligncenter" width="590"] © Jean Pierre Lozi/cc-by-sa-3.0[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Biot (Occitan: Biòt) is a small fortified medieval hilltop village in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur near Antibes, between Nice and Cannes. Many people come to Biot for its renowned cubist art museum of Fernand Leger as well as the winding cobbled lanes on the elevated fort. This village, that is now known for its ceramics and glassblowing, dates to prehistoric times.
For a long period prior to ...
[ read more ]
