This paper was originally delivered at a 1996 symposium entitled "Arab Jerusalem," hosted by the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University. We thank Georgetown and Dr. Tleel for permission to republish the paper here in revised form.
My family name is Tleel and can be traced back approximately four hundred years. On a family tombstone dated 1833 in the Greek Orthodox cemetery on Mount Zion there are two inscriptions, in Arabic and in Greek and an engraving of tools used by goldsmiths. My great grandfathers were goldsmiths. "Tleel" or "It-Tleel," as it is engraved on family tombstones, is an Arabic name that means "the one who plates metals with silver or gold."
As a twentieth-century Palestinian, I have lived for almost seven decades in Jerusalem. I lived its daily agonies and its passion. I tasted all the tragedies and the injustices inflicted upon the Palestinian people. I watched the Jerusalem sun rising and setting, the moon shining, and the seasons revolving.
Today, few who can be considered part of Jerusalem‘s living history are still alive. My generation is disappearing. This essay preserves some personal experiences that I think should not remain hidden under Jerusalem‘s stones.
The Old City Walls
Our house stood halfway between the Old City walls and the narrow but busy Suleiman Road; the massive Notre Dame Hospice confronted us from the other side of the road. Two long edge-to-edge balconies on both sides of the house were like those in a theater. The first faced the continuously moving stage of Suleiman Road and the windows of the Hospice. The second--private, sentimental, and mystical--used to give us the privilege of watching day and night the unparalleled scenery of the stones of the Old City wall. We grew up with them. Our small and usually neglected garden stretched along the walls and against them leaned a row of several storerooms and a pigeon-cage.
Time and negligence had done its work on the 454-year-old wall. One of the stones had many cracks and slowly it broke into pieces and began to move out of its place. Finally it came out, partly by itself and partly with our help when we children played games, made fires, and "baked" in it. We touched the remaining stones almost every day and talked to the wall, lovingly unconscious of what we were doing. Sometimes, with the inattentiveness of children, we sensed from four centuries back the movements of those Palestinian masons‘ hands that had worked so skillfully at the wall.
On my daily way to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate School, I would pass through the New Gate into the Old City. The New Gate gave a kind of naked, unembarrassed access then, but later, when trouble flared up all over the town, the British built a big iron gate in it with a smaller wicket-gate on the right. On calm days it was open for every one, but on turbulent ones--and that meant almost the entire year--it was shut. The British soldiers on guard would not let us pass, so we would have to make a long detour around the wall and get to school in the Old City through Jaffa Gate. We would always grumble over that extra walk, especially in winter.
One rainy New Year‘s Day, my brother David and I visited his religious classmates at the Greek Orthodox Monastery in the Old City. We spent the day with them, ate with them, including the monastery‘s own wheat bread. This was the only way to have a good time then. Suddenly, a curfew was declared. Inside you could not get out; outside you could not get in. Night was coming and we were worried. We could not sleep at the Monastery (the rules did not allow it) so we left before the door closed. We decided to visit Evangelia, a family friend who lived at Saidnaya Convent in the Christian Quarter. Nuns, older people, and unmarried lay persons could live at this old convent, which gets its name from the church inside its walls.
The original name of the convent was St. Anne‘s, but a long time ago a wonder-working icon of the Virgin Mary vanished from the convent of Saidnaya near Damascus, Syria. It was discovered at St. Anne‘s in Jerusalem. Everyone in Damascus and at the Saidnaya Convent was pleased to get back the icon, but nobody could understand how it had gotten to the Holy City. The Damascenes retrieved their icon, but it vanished again only to be discovered again at St. Anne‘s in Jerusalem. It was decided that this was a miracle and the icon of Blessed Mary should remain in Jerusalem, near her mother St. Anne, where clearly it wanted to be. Since then, the Convent has been called Saidnaya.
It was dark when we arrived at Evangelia‘s. She was surprised to see us visiting her so late, but did her best to comfort us in our fright. There was a knock at the door. It was our father looking for us. We will never know why he thought we would be there. On asking him how he had gotten into the Old City in spite of the curfew, he told us he had gone for help to the British soldiers who were neighbors of ours at the Notre Dame Hospice. (The British took over the Hospice in troubled times, including during World War II. Then the name of the Hospice was Notre Dame de France, but since 1967 it has been called Notre Dame de Jerusalem).
Strikes, curfews, and demonstrations became a way of life during the 1936 rebellion against the British. The Arab population was fighting for its independence from British rule. There was near total unemployment. People with independent professions suffered the most. My father, a dentist, was affected as well, since no patient could visit him for treatment. My brother David was luckier. He was a stamp collector and I accompanied him on his adventures. He used to meet a German chap, an employee in the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in the Old City who would examine his stamps attentively, and if he liked or needed the assortment, would take them and pay my brother one shilling (five piasters or fifty mills). That money was enough to buy three okiyeh (600 gm) of meat or 15 eggs.
One day a slowly moving lorry came from the vicinity of the Damascus Gate and ascended Suleiman Road. As it got close to Notre Dame Hospice, where the road gets steeper, the lorry slowed down even more. The engine groaned and the driver shifted gears. A sign at the side of the lorry read, "Health Department - Government of Palestine." That was why it was on the road in spite of the curfew. We immediately assumed that the destination would be the government hospital at the Russian Compound, not far from our house.
Curious, we looked quickly at the half-open back of the vehicle from our long balcony. What a view and what a cargo! Loaves of bread--hundreds, maybe thousands of loaves. Since there was no room inside the lorry, two lone passengers, local employees of the Health Department, were sitting uncomfortably on the thin upper edge of the back door. We waved at them politely. They got our message. From the mountain of loaves they took two and with all their strength threw them over towards our balcony. One, a direct hit, reached us safely. The second fell on the road. A few moments later, when the lorry was out of sight, we stole out and whisked it away, defying the curfew. They were two hot, round loaves, freshly baked. What a blessing they were after a weeklong house confinement.
The Sudden Change
Unexpectedly, our war came to a standstill--not because the parties concerned decided to make peace, but because the big powers imposed peace on them. World War II had broken out, and it was others‘ turn to taste the bitterness of war. The break lasted almost five years, as long as the war lasted. Those five years I shall never forget; they were the best and most peaceful of my life.
Thousands of British, Australian, Irish, Scottish, Greek, African, Indian and a cocktail of Allied Forces were stationed in Palestine. Hotels, hospices, schools and other buildings had to be evacuated and put at the disposal of the military. Convents, hospices, and houses were also crammed with Greek and Polish refugees who were fleeing the German occupation of their homelands.
Now everybody was busy; there was no more unemployment. My father had patients from all the communities and all parts of the city. Many soldiers came for treatment as well. Prices soared and many essential commodities became expensive. The war was not on the side of the salaried classes and not much was done to compensate them in a satisfactory way. They were in a disadvantageous position compared to those with independent professions.
The sugar was no longer white; only a brown, sticky sugar was available in the market. For the first time ration books were introduced. Most foodstuffs, especially imported and processed foods, were rationed. The bread was almost black. The sick and elderly could buy white bread, but were limited to one loaf daily and needed a doctor‘s prescription, which was valid for only a month.
The few private cars were then immobilized to save fuel, the only exceptions being cars owned by doctors and other special cases. Clothing was made from cloth of utilitarian quality. Children and adults both wore khaki shorts during the summer. Many materials and goods were manufactured locally. The quality was poor, but usable under the circumstances. Many goods and facilities were completely out of stock and unavailable even in the soaring black market.
The army had all it needed. In spite of the strict military regulations, some goods designated for the army were smuggled onto the black market and to individuals. Contraband trade from neighboring countries, especially Transjordan, was also thriving. In spite of these conditions, no one starved and in general few complained. The standard of living rose, and all enjoyed a normal life, without fear, curfews, roadblocks, communal strife, or bloody incidents. An unwritten peace reigned in our region while war raged in Europe and North Africa.
New roads were constructed and old ones repaired or widened to facilitate the movements of the British and Allied forces. All German and Italian nationals were taken into custody and treated as prisoners of war. Some locals suspected of sympathizing with the enemy were also arrested. A blackout during the first years of the war was strictly enforced. But the sirens never sounded for an air raid and Jerusalem was never bombed by air during World War II.
Then the war in Europe was over. Victory day celebrations were emotional, with soldiers dancing and drinking in the streets of Jerusalem. Church bells rang and public buildings were decorated and illuminated. It was not the end of our war, yet we celebrated as if it were. That feeling of jubilation was coveted, for our war may never end.
Renewal of the Fighting
Victory Day celebrations ended, the bells stopped ringing, and the time came to say farewell to five years of tranquillity. Arabs, Jews, and the British began fighting one another again, this time more intensively. Some of my worst teenage memories are of the Semiramis Hotel, the King David Hotel, the Palestine Post building, Ben Yehuda Street, Jerusalem District Police Headquarters, and Deir Yassin. These places were battlegrounds in a war in which many innocent civilians lost their lives. The funerals of the King David Hotel victims still parade in front of my eyes. People were dug out of the debris days after the explosion, the corpses decomposing. We had to cover our noses when the funerals passed through.
Among the victims of these events were friends, neighbors, acquaintances: young Chrysanthi Antipa, Assistant District Commissioner Atallah Mantoura, and our friend Hayat Bilbeisi, a smart young teacher who went to school on April 9th and never came home to her semi-paralytic mother. Her body remains somewhere in Deir Yassin, covered with flowers of spring.
In June 1945, a simple and informal ceremony marked a memorable event in my life. Patriarch Timotheos handed to my classmates and me the Diploma of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate‘s Gymnasium. At his residence on the Mount of Olives he blessed us in a fatherly way and wished us a happy and fruitful future, though at the time the future looked uncertain and difficult.
On November 4th, 1945 the French Faculty of Beirut opened its doors for the academic year, and the students old and new began their studies. I was among the first-year students admitted to the Dental School. The trip by car from Jerusalem to Beirut and vice versa was a journey of six to seven hours, including the time spent on both the Ras el-Naqura check points.
The Partition
In November 1947 in New York the member states of the UN voted to partition Palestine into two states, one Arab and one Jewish, with an international Jerusalem. Escalation of hostilities followed that historic resolution. The Arabs rejected the partition. How could a true mother accept the bisection of her own child? The Jews accepted it. For the British part, His Majesty‘s Government declared its decision to evacuate Palestine by May 15th, 1948 and end the British Mandate. Who believed that then? Who believed that they could carry out that decision? These are only stories, we said to ourselves, and nothing more than another ploy in British politics.
In November 1947 with summer vacation over, I left Jerusalem and went to Beirut for my third year of dental school. I came back to Jerusalem for a short Christmas vacation. I heard the tremendous explosion that blew up the Semiramis Hotel. A couple of days later I returned to Beirut. It was the last time I would cross the Ras el-Naqura borders, for shortly afterwards they were closed for a long, long time.
On May 15th, 1948, I was in Beirut preparing myself for annual exams when it was announced that the last British High Commissioner Alan Cunningham had left Jerusalem and three decades of British rule had ended. In 1917 they had entered Jerusalem to the fanfare of trumpets. They left without ceremony, plunging Jerusalem and the entire region into a seemingly endless state of chaos.
At the end of August 1948, I traveled by car to Jerusalem. This time I had to make a painstaking detour through Lebanon, Syria, and Transjordan. I arrived in the Old City the next day and saw a city cut in half (Arab and Israeli). I joined my family, which had taken refuge inside the Old City. With a move of fifty meters, we had become refugees. The family was sandwiched between Israeli gunfire from the Notre Dame rooftops and Arab defenders on the Old City walls. My family had no choice but to leave--our home had become a battlefield.
The Old City of Jerusalem
Only by living inside the Old City, enclosed by its walls, can you really come to know Jerusalem. Along its narrow streets you begin to feel its force. You are changed by its shrines and holy places, you are baptized by the city of stone. But it is not easy to be a Jerusalemite. A thorny path runs alongside its joys.
The great are small inside the Old City. Heads of state are stripped of their power. Popes, patriarchs, kings--all remove their crowns. I saw the Emperor of Ethiopia, the Negus Haile Selassie, walking barefoot through Jerusalem‘s streets and watched him kneel as he entered the Church of the Resurrection. He prayed before Christ‘s Holy Sepulcher and made a vow. A victor returning to his homeland, he fulfilled that vow by offering his imperial crown and robes to the Patriarchate of Jerusalem.
When the Patriarch of Jerusalem (the Rum, or Greek Orthodox) arrives in procession at the foot of Golgotha on Good Friday, wearing all his impressive vestment, he takes off his miter, places it on a silver tray, and covers his head with the usual Orthodox clerical hat. He cannot go up the hill of the Crucifixion wearing the miter--only the King of Kings is crowned there. It is the City of the King of Kings, and earthly kings and lords are not its masters. No human can ever possess Jerusalem. "How dare you come up over the place where the King of Kings and Master of Masters is hanging on the Cross and wears on His head the crown of thorns," said the voice to the mighty Heraclius, Emperor of Byzantium, and his imperial crown fell from his head. He was returning victorious from the war against the Persians (630 CE), and he brought back the True Cross, which had been desecrated in 614. Bareheaded, the Emperor continued on his way and raised the Holy Cross again at the top of Golgotha.
Life in Jordanian Jerusalem
As the years slipped by, the balm of time helped ease the pain of the 1948 war, though deep wounds remained. The misadventures of the Arab Palestinian people, after the Partition resolution and the subsequent events, were almost unique in the history of peoples and nations. The Palestinians, a brave and intelligent nation, became a stateless people. Rich became poor and hungry, and one and a half million were scattered not only to neighboring Arab countries, but to every corner of the globe. As for us Jerusalemites, Jewish shelling forced us to abandon our fashionable homes and neighborhoods in Qatamon, the Greek Colony, the German Colony, Talbiyyeh, Upper and Lower Baq‘a, Malcha, Lifta, Musrara, and other places that have been occupied since 1948 by Jewish immigrants. We took refuge in the Old City, within its walls, convents, and churches, and in every available shelter. There we stayed for days and nights, for months, waiting in vain to return to our homes. The short excursion never ended.
The Second Round
Then the 1967 War came. At noon on June 7th, the third day of the war, I watched Israeli paratroopers advance towards our house from the direction of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate. I was careful not to be seen. I realized that they were Israelis only when I heard them speaking Hebrew under the windows of our house. After their victory, the Israeli authorities did not waste time in changing the face of Jerusalem. They started with what is closest to their heart--the Wailing, or Western Wall--emptying out the quarter of the al-Maghribia (North African Muslims) nearest the Wall. Maghribi families were forced out and their tiny old homes were leveled to the ground by bulldozers. Soon the façade of the massive Western Wall, hidden from direct view for centuries, was exposed and a huge plaza cleared in front of it.
The row of buildings embracing the Old City wall from Jaffa Gate around past New Gate to Damascus Gate was pulled down. These structures had been standing in a no man‘s land, deteriorating since being damaged in the 1948 War. The gigantic convent of the cloistered Reparatrice sisters was brought down in a couple of days. Our house (a property of the Mushahwar family), the old Post Office building, the shops belonging to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, the Terra Santa Franciscan School, the Syrian Catholic church, and other private houses were razed, paving the way for the green belt and the wide road that today runs alongside the Old City walls. Much of the beautiful wall where our house stood was buried under the road. Near the Armenian quarter, many shops and a new factory for plastic goods, owned by the Abdeen family, were destroyed. Orders were given to level that area within twelve hours. Christian and Muslim neighborhoods were ordered on short notice to evacuate their homes to pave the way for the accommodation of Jewish families in the old Jewish quarter, later completely renovated. The inadequate recompense made to the Christian and Muslim families by Israeli authorities never made up for the manner in which they were forced out and the great loss they suffered. A friend of mine who spent his childhood with his family in that quarter continues to be haunted by the memories of that experience.
The "Unholy" Census
On Monday, June 26th, 1967 the citizens of Arab Jerusalem were confined to their houses under a strict curfew, and the city was cut off from the rest of the world. Once again, people inside the Old City could not get out, and people outside could not get in. The Jerusalem municipal boundaries were re-defined by the Israelis, and the Jerusalemites of the Old City and East Jerusalem had to register. The new rulers invested themselves with the right to designate the limits of Jerusalem and to grant the precious citizenship of Jerusalem only to those who happened to be in the city on that decisive day. Arab or non-Arab Jerusalemites who happened to be absent lost the right to have their names put in the exclusive list of Jerusalemites under Israeli law. They called it a census, but it was not really a census. It was a biased, premeditated, mass usurpation. It was a violation of the basic human rights of the Arab as well as foreign Jerusalemites who for generations had been genuine citizens of the city. It was a shameful attempt to diminish a nation by bureaucratic fiat, a discriminative plan to create a Jewish majority in the city. Arab or non-Arab, a Jerusalemite by birth or residence suddenly was no more a Jerusalemite. Only American Jews, Russian immigrants, Eastern and Western European Jews, Ethiopians and all other Jews coming from every corner of the world were and are eligible as of June 26, 1967 for citizenship. Those who came to our house to write down on special forms our names and particulars were Arabic-speaking civilians dispatched by the Israeli Ministry of Interior.
On June 27th, a day after the "census," the Israeli Knesset passed a law annexing Arab Jerusalem and the following day proclaimed the municipal unification of the city. The newly-captured parts of Jerusalem that had been under Jordanian rule from 1948 until 1967, including the Old City, now became formally and unilaterally annexed and incorporated into the limits of the Jerusalem municipality under Israeli civil administration. Jerusalem, west and east, Israeli and Arab, was declared and trumpeted the "eternal capital" of the State of Israel (although no country except Costa Rica, El Salvador, and Guatemala has recognized this unilateral act).
Arab Jerusalemites were then entitled to certain privileges including the right to travel freely within Israel. Yet the blue identity cards issued to the citizens of East Jerusalem were not as thaumaturgical as they were proclaimed to be. The cards gave us the right to pay taxes, but never gave my father the right to recover his large property in the Musrara quarter, which has been occupied since 1948. He died bitter and frustrated.
Our property still stands there between New and Damascus Gates. Jerusalemites living in the Old City started building outside the walls in the Musrara by the end of the last century, including my grandfather, Daoud, who built a home there for the family in 1896. Consisting of two structures, 27 rooms, and a garden in the middle, it is the house where my father and his brothers and sisters grew up.
Dissolution of the Arab Municipal Council
Late in the afternoon of June 29th, 1967, my cousin, Dr. Ibrahim Tleel, and his wife paid us a visit. He stayed for a while and then left for the Hotel Gloria in the Old City. The hotel is a recent structure that sits atop the City Hall of Arab Jerusalem, which is much older. Both are only a few minutes from our house and are the property of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate. The mayor and the members of the Municipal Council (of the Jordanian part of Jerusalem) had been summoned to a meeting by the Israeli military authorities at the Gloria Hotel. The military had been occupying the Hotel and the Military Governor, General Herzog (later President of Israel), had his offices there.
My cousin was back sooner than we had expected, but he was not alone. Accompanying him was none other than the Honorable Ruhi al-Khatib, the Mayor of Arab Jerusalem, who was a friend of the family. We were honored by the visit and welcomed both the mayor and his deputy with a warm ahlan wa sahlan. They took a seat without uttering a word. They looked grim and pensive. Immediately we felt that something dramatic had taken place. No one attempted to disrupt their thoughts at first, but soon, when we thought we could politely break the silence, we asked about their disquieting comportment.
"The Israelis called us to announce the dissolution of the Municipal Council and my dismissal from the Mayoralty," the Mayor said with bitterness. "Thank God, they [the Israelis] are the ones who relieved me of my office so nobody can ever accuse me of cooperating with them and betraying the City and the King."
From that moment on the Israelis married their Jewish Jerusalem to Arab Jerusalem by force. Now for the first time our Jerusalem (Arab) was named "East Jerusalem" and for the first time Arabic radio programs on the Israeli Broadcasting Station inaugurated the broadcast with "Min Urushalim/Al-Quds."
The morning following the dissolution of the Municipal Council, I was on my way to Omar Ibn El-Khattab Square. As I passed by the municipal building at St. Dimitri Street in the Old City, I was shocked to see Jewish municipal employees taking away the Arab municipality‘s furniture. I recognized Mayor Ruhi el-Khatib‘s armchairs and other fine office furniture. The furniture was loaded onto a waiting van and taken to West Jerusalem. A short, glorious phase of the eternally revolving history of Jerusalem was over.
Since then, Jerusalem has become a physically united city, but suffers mentally from schizophrenia. The Jewish population of the western section is always celebrating and rejoicing while the Arab eastern part is always in deep mourning. When our city is silent and asleep in darkness, our next-door neighbors are dancing and singing in their streets, which are decorated with Israeli banners and multi-colored lights.
Jerusalem and the International Community
The unilateral incorporation of Arab Jerusalem into the civil administration of Israeli West Jerusalem did not receive international support. According to UN Resolutions 242 and 338, Arab East Jerusalem is under military occupation, as are the other Arab territories occupied during the 1967 war. The final status of Jerusalem is to be negotiated and agreed upon by all parties concerned. Consequently, the Consular Corps treats Jerusalem under the principles of keeping the city as a "corpus separatum" and maintaining the religious status quo.
The governments of the US, UK, France, Italy, Greece, Belgium, Spain, and Sweden observe these principles. After the 1967 war, they maintained their consulates in Arab Jerusalem as in the days of Jordanian rule. Ruhi al-Khatib was still considered the legitimate mayor of Arab Jerusalem. But this did not last for long, for he was among the first Palestinians to be deported to Amman by the Israeli Government. His deputy, my cousin Ibrahim Tleel, took his place, and served as acting Mayor of Jerusalem until his death in January 1977. He was succeeded by a member of the Municipal Council, Amin Majaj. According to tradition, the Mayor of Jerusalem is a Muslim, but the Deputy or the Acting Mayor is a Christian. In May 1993, after a long exile in Jordan, Ruhi al-Khatib was allowed to return to Jerusalem where the Palestinians and the international community welcomed him warmly. He died in Amman and was buried in Jerusalem on Friday July 8th, 1994.
I am Jerusalem
I am the uninterrupted history of Jerusalem. I am the Walls of Jerusalem. When Patriarch Abraham came to Cannan from Ur of the Chaldees about 1850 BC I was in Salem, Urusalimu, the Canaanite city of Melchizedek, priest of the most high God. I am the bridge over which all the BC generations passed to the AD generations. I am the Old and the New Testament. I am Constantine the Great, Emperor and Founder of Byzantium, the Eastern Roman Empire, who built the Church of the Anastasis (Resurrection, 326-336). I am Patriarch Sophronius the Rum, the Patriarch of Al-Milleh Al-Malakieh (the Royal Nation) who in 637 handed over to the Arab Caliph, Omar Ibn Al-Kahattab, the Holy City of Jerusalem. The Caliph refrained from praying in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher; in return, he gave Sophronios the celebrated al-Uhdah al-umariyyah, the foundation-document for Muslim-Christian understanding, coexistence, and mutual acceptance.
I am a sufferer from the Crusaders‘ ill treatment in 1099. In 1187 I was rehabilitated by Salah el-Din. The Mamluks conquered me in 1250. In 1517 the Ottomans occupied me for 400 years. My uncle was forced to serve in the Turkish army; he was taken and never came back. In 1917 the British Troops distributed to the Jerusalemites sugar and chocolates. When they left, they spread chaos and bitterness. But the Old City was not lost. A handful of heroic Arab Jerusalemites shielded it.
Jerusalem is a religious idiosyncrasy, unparalleled and beyond comparison. Jerusalem must remain a religious entity, a religious being, for all. This is its raison d‘être and the source of the beauty of the Holy City. Jerusalem is not a capital and should not be regarded as such, because then we minimize its significance and do not respect its mission. Our predecessors, who had more knowledge and wisdom than we on the eve of the year 2,000 CE, respected Jerusalem‘s mission and never made the city a capital. Jerusalem is a living entity, an eternal tripartite physiognomy--but not an eternal capital.