Orient House is a building located in East Jerusalem that served as the headquarters of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in the 1980s and 1990s. Built in 1897 by Ismail Musa Al-Husseini, it has been owned by the Al-Husseini family since. Originally intended to serve as a family residence, it was at times vacated to host important guests, such as Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany in 1898 and Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia in 1936. read more…
The Church of the Pater Noster (French: Église du Pater Noster) is a Catholic church located on the Mount of Olives in East Jerusalem. It is part of a Carmelite monastery of cloistered nuns, also known as the Sanctuary of the Eleona. The Church of the Pater Noster stands next to the ruins of the 4th-century Late Roman/Early ByzantineChurch of Eleona. The ruins of the Eleona were rediscovered in the 20th century and its walls were partially rebuilt. Today, France administers the land on which both churches and the entire monastery are standing, following the Ottoman capitulations, as the Eleona Domain (French: Domaine de l’Éléona), part of the French national domain in the Holy Land, which has been formalised by the Fischer-Chauvel Agreement of 1948-49, though the agreement has not been ratified by Israel’s Knesset. read more…
The Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue (Ashkenazi Hebrew: Tiferes Yisroel), most often spelled Tiferet Israel, also known as the Nisan Bak Shul, after its co-founder, Nisan Bak, is a former prominent HasidicJewish congregation and synagogue, located in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. Designed by Nisan Bak, the former synagogue was completed in 1872 and partially destroyed in 1948. read more…
On 7 October 2023, the paramilitary wings of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the PFLP, and the DFLP launched a series of coordinated armed incursions into the Gaza envelope of neighboring Israeli territory, the first invasion of Israel since the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. This incursion fell on the day of Simchat Torah, right after the festival of Sukkot, a Sabbath day. The attacks initiated the 2023 Israel–Hamas war, almost exactly 50 years after Operation Badr and the greater Yom Kippur War of 6 October 1973. Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups named the attacks Operation Al-Aqsa Flood (or Deluge), while in Israel they are referred to as Black Saturday or the Simchat Torah Massacre and internationally as the 7 October attack. read more…
French Hill, is an Israeli settlement in northern East Jerusalem. It is located on territory that has been occupied since the Six-Day War in 1967 and later unilaterally annexed by Israel under the Jerusalem Law, in a move internationally condemned as illegal, “null and void” under international law, in 1980. The international community considers Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem, such as French Hill, illegal under international law, which the Israeli government disputes. read more…
The Rockefeller Archeological Museum, formerly the Palestine Archaeological Museum (“PAM”; 1938–1967), is an archaeologymuseum located in East Jerusalem, next to Herod’s Gate, that houses a large collection of artifacts unearthed in the excavations conducted in the region of Palestine, mainly in the 1920s and 1930s, under the British authorities. read more…
The Arab Souk Couk, also known as the Arab Souq Couq, Arabic Market of Wondrous Expectations or Suq El-Bazar, is a large bazaar occupying approximately 100 acres (400,000 m²) of area in the Old City of Jerusalem. About 800 merchants operate a variety of businesses in closely-packed shop stalls along a network of alleyways primarily in the Muslim Quarter and the Christian Quarter, located in the northern part of the Old City. The New York Times described the market in a 1982 publishing as “an explosion of colour, movement and smell.” read more…
