Jerusalem Is Not a Museum
Settlement Report | Vol. 10 No. 8 | Winter 2000
Jerusalem today has many defenders from many countries and many
religions. It seems that everyone not only has an opinion about the
city but also rights that must be recognized and accommodated before
there can be a sustainable peace. Such claims are rooted in Jerusalem's
bloody and contentious religious heritage, representing contemporary
manifestations of sentiments and beliefs imbedded in history. Too often
they spring from a fascination with Jerusalem's former glories more
than they reflect a concern for its problematic future.
It is perhaps not so strange then that the current diplomatic debate on Jerusalem's future relates to the city as if it were a museum--a repository of ancient monuments to grandeur and piety--rather than the suffering metropolis of more than half a million people with problems rooted in the twenty-first century. Diplomacy and the public narrative that results focus on the right to rule the inanimate Jerusalem, while the living Jerusalem--its people, its lands, and its hope for dynamic development in the future--is all but ignored.
Certainly the question of sovereignty over the Haram al-Sharif is an important issue, but the vitality of the presumptive Palestinian capital of East Jerusalem--an area that today is little more than a moribund collection of isolated neighborhoods--is no less important. How long can an Arab Jerusalem survive--even one defined as the capital of Palestine--if all that it has to commend it are the relics of its bygone magnificence?
Any visitor to East Jerusalem today can see the decline of the Arab city. It has been hostage to decades of neglect and discrimination. Jordan's Hashemite leaders favored Amman over Jerusalem. The city that had been split into two by war suffered further from official neglect. Israel, after its victory in 1967, set out to remake Arab East Jerusalem in its own image, and in so doing it has tried its best to pretend that Jerusalem's Arabs were not really there. Palestinian neighborhoods have been cut off from each other by Israeli settlements and roads. The depressing commercial district around Salah Eddin Street, starved of capital investment and infrastructure improvements, is more typical of an impoverished small town than a city of international stature. As Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem flourished, Palestinian Jerusalem languished. Commerce and culture fled north, to Ramallah, a process begun by Israel's policy of "closure" initiated during the 1991 Gulf War and hastened by the creation of Palestinian rule just north of the city. Today, a city all but on life support dies when the sun sets, its shops shuttered, its streets deserted.
None of the potential solutions for Jerusalem raised during these last months begin to answer the central question upon which the city's future rests: How can East Jerusalem be transformed into a thriving Palestinian metropolis? When Israel conquered the city in 1967, it expanded its boundaries by 70,000 dunams. One-third of this amount was confiscated for "public purposes" and now boasts neighborhoods where almost 200,000 Israelis live. These lands are forever lost to Palestinian development. Israel has allocated only 14 percent--less than 10,000 dunams--of the entire area it annexed for residential construction to meet the needs of a fast growing Palestinian community approximately equal to its Israeli neighbors. The remaining lands, vital for any Palestinian plan to revitalize the city, are off limits to Palestinian development. This dilemma is the real key to Jerusalem's future, yet there is no indication that diplomats have addressed this critical issue. Unless they do, it is not at all certain that the demise of Palestinian Jerusalem can be reversed. Under the best of circumstances the modern monuments of Israel's occupation pose a tremendous obstacle to the creation of a dynamic Palestinian urban area that can serve as the capital of a sovereign Palestine.
It is certain that "the best of circumstances" will never prevail. Can East Jerusalem then ever become a truly capital city? Sovereignty over al-Aqsa and pockets of Palestinian development scattered like stones throughout the city will not be enough to halt Arab Jerusalem's decline.
Jerusalem needs to be re-created as a metropolis that lives up to its lofty traditions and that provides a decent environment for all of its inhabitants. These are considerations that not only diplomats but also all those concerned for Jerusalem's future need to ponder as they seek to fashion a viable future for the city and its people.
It is perhaps not so strange then that the current diplomatic debate on Jerusalem's future relates to the city as if it were a museum--a repository of ancient monuments to grandeur and piety--rather than the suffering metropolis of more than half a million people with problems rooted in the twenty-first century. Diplomacy and the public narrative that results focus on the right to rule the inanimate Jerusalem, while the living Jerusalem--its people, its lands, and its hope for dynamic development in the future--is all but ignored.
Certainly the question of sovereignty over the Haram al-Sharif is an important issue, but the vitality of the presumptive Palestinian capital of East Jerusalem--an area that today is little more than a moribund collection of isolated neighborhoods--is no less important. How long can an Arab Jerusalem survive--even one defined as the capital of Palestine--if all that it has to commend it are the relics of its bygone magnificence?
Any visitor to East Jerusalem today can see the decline of the Arab city. It has been hostage to decades of neglect and discrimination. Jordan's Hashemite leaders favored Amman over Jerusalem. The city that had been split into two by war suffered further from official neglect. Israel, after its victory in 1967, set out to remake Arab East Jerusalem in its own image, and in so doing it has tried its best to pretend that Jerusalem's Arabs were not really there. Palestinian neighborhoods have been cut off from each other by Israeli settlements and roads. The depressing commercial district around Salah Eddin Street, starved of capital investment and infrastructure improvements, is more typical of an impoverished small town than a city of international stature. As Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem flourished, Palestinian Jerusalem languished. Commerce and culture fled north, to Ramallah, a process begun by Israel's policy of "closure" initiated during the 1991 Gulf War and hastened by the creation of Palestinian rule just north of the city. Today, a city all but on life support dies when the sun sets, its shops shuttered, its streets deserted.
None of the potential solutions for Jerusalem raised during these last months begin to answer the central question upon which the city's future rests: How can East Jerusalem be transformed into a thriving Palestinian metropolis? When Israel conquered the city in 1967, it expanded its boundaries by 70,000 dunams. One-third of this amount was confiscated for "public purposes" and now boasts neighborhoods where almost 200,000 Israelis live. These lands are forever lost to Palestinian development. Israel has allocated only 14 percent--less than 10,000 dunams--of the entire area it annexed for residential construction to meet the needs of a fast growing Palestinian community approximately equal to its Israeli neighbors. The remaining lands, vital for any Palestinian plan to revitalize the city, are off limits to Palestinian development. This dilemma is the real key to Jerusalem's future, yet there is no indication that diplomats have addressed this critical issue. Unless they do, it is not at all certain that the demise of Palestinian Jerusalem can be reversed. Under the best of circumstances the modern monuments of Israel's occupation pose a tremendous obstacle to the creation of a dynamic Palestinian urban area that can serve as the capital of a sovereign Palestine.
It is certain that "the best of circumstances" will never prevail. Can East Jerusalem then ever become a truly capital city? Sovereignty over al-Aqsa and pockets of Palestinian development scattered like stones throughout the city will not be enough to halt Arab Jerusalem's decline.
Jerusalem needs to be re-created as a metropolis that lives up to its lofty traditions and that provides a decent environment for all of its inhabitants. These are considerations that not only diplomats but also all those concerned for Jerusalem's future need to ponder as they seek to fashion a viable future for the city and its people.
