The city was largely extended westwards after the Neo-Assyrian destruction of the northern Kingdom of Israel and the resulting influx of refugees. Destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BCE, it was rebuilt on a smaller scale in about 440 BCE, during the Persian period, when, according to the Bible, Nehemiah led the Jews who returned from the Babylonian Exile. An additional, so-called Second Wall, was built by King Herod the Great. In 41-44 CE, Agrippa, king of Judea, started building the so-called "Third Wall" around the northern suburbs. The entire city was totally destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE.
The northern part of the city was rebuilt by the Emperor Hadrian around 130, and in the Byzantine period the city was extended and again enclosed by walls. Muslims occupied it in 637 CE under the second caliph, `Umar Ibn al-Khattab who annexed it to the Islamic Arab Empire. In 1099, the city was captured by the army of the First Crusade and it remained in their hands until recaptured by the Arab Muslims, led by Saladin, in 1187. In 1219, the walls of the city were razed by Mu'azzim Sultan of Damascus; in 1229, by treaty with Egypt, Jerusalem came into the hands of Frederick II of Germany. In 1239 he began to rebuild the walls, but they were demolished again by Da'ud, the emir of Kerak.
In 1243, Jerusalem came again under the control of the Christians, and the walls were repaired. The Kharezmian Tatars took the city in 1244 and Sultan Malik al-Muazzam razed the walls, rendering it again defenseless and dealing a heavy blow to the city's status. The current walls of the Old City were built in 1535-1542 by the Ottoman Turkish sultan Suleiman the Magnificent. It contain 35 towers, and had six gates, to which a seventh, the New Gate, was added in 1887; several other, older gates, have been walled up over the centuries.
Following the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the Old City was captured by Jordan and all its Jewish residents were evicted. During the Six-Day War in 1967, Israeli forces captured the Old City along with the rest of East Jerusalem, subsequently annexing them as Israeli territory and reuniting them with the western part of the city. Today, the Israeli government controls the entire area, which it considers part of its national capital. However, the Jerusalem Law of 1980, which effectively annexed East Jerusalem to Israel, was declared null and void by United Nations Security Council Resolution 478.
Traditionally, the Old City has been divided into four uneven quarters, although the current designations were introduced only in the 19th century. Today, the Old City is roughly divided (going counterclockwise from the northeastern corner) into the Muslim Quarter, Christian Quarter, Armenian Quarter and Jewish Quarter.
Old City of Jerusalem and its Walls, which become an UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1981, at the proposal of Jordan, contains several sites of key religious importance (the ones with links are presented on the blog):
- Temple Mount
- Western Wall
- Church of the Holy Sepulchre
- Via Dolorosa
- Dome of the Rock
- Al-Aqsa Mosque
Old City of Jerusalem and its Walls - UNESCO official website
Old City (Jerusalem) - Wikipedia
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