Foundations
What Is Jerusalem?
Today’s Jerusalem is a city that remains undefined in any official sense that would be considered legitimate by all its residents. Residents must navigate an imposed labyrinthine maze of borders, jurisdictions, and fragmented spaces that is difficult for non-natives to fathom. Understanding these complexities is the starting point for anyone wanting to grasp the realities faced by Jerusalem’s Palestinians.
Featured in This Topic
Under the radar, Palestinian Jerusalemites are also feeling the brunt of Israel’s fury in the wake of October 7. A community at risk takes stock.
Where is Jerusalem? The answer is a lot more complex and unclear than you might think.
The Oslo Accords were supposed to launch an interim five-year stage until final negotiations. Thirty years later they are still technically in effect. What has happened to Palestinian East Jerusalem?
The mufti’s luxurious home in Sheikh Jarrah is a microcosm of the city’s rich and vibrant Palestinian past—and of its erasure by Israeli authorities.
An introduction to the applications of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) within the context of the occupied Palestinian Territory (oPT), including East Jerusalem.
How Israel seeks to reshape the broader Jerusalem region, ensuring permanent control and blocking the possibility of Palestinian communal life
This definitive history of Jerusalem’s iconic Moroccan Quarter explains its significance over centuries, how Israel destroyed it overnight, and why it still matters. A book review.
A collection of 44 essays and poems brings to life the voices of Jerusalem’s indigenous Palestinian community and the visitors who encountered them.
Colonial Jerusalem, written by Thomas Abowd in 2014, seems more relevant today than ever. A book review.
A rare view of Jerusalem as it appeared at the moment of transition from Ottoman to British rule, in the early 1920s
A look back at Jerusalem’s rulers since ancient times and the city’s population based on more recent censuses
The Story in Numbers
10
Number of times the official Jerusalem municipal boundaries have changed since 1917 [1]
19.2 sq km
The area of the city of Jerusalem under the British Mandate period, 1917–47 [2]
28
Number of Palestinian localities that Israel unilaterally incorporated into the city upon expanding the municipal boundaries in 1967 to add areas on the (Arab) eastern side of the city that had not previously belonged to it [3]
70 sq km
Newly expanded area of East Jerusalem after Israel unilaterally expanded the boundaries in June, 1967, de facto annexing an additional 64 sq km to East Jerusalem from the original 6 sq km, including many Palestinian villages that had not previously been in the city [4]
126.4 sq km
The total area of the city of Jerusalem today [5]
440 sq km
The area of “Greater Jerusalem,” the expanded, Jewish-majority Jerusalem that Israel envisions and is rapidly developing [6]
0
Number of times the Palestinian residents of Jerusalem have been consulted or given an opportunity to influence where the official municipal boundaries of Jerusalem should be [7]
Notes
1. See Table 1 in Where Is Jerusalem?.
2. See Table 1 in Where Is Jerusalem?.
3. See Table 1 in Where Is Jerusalem?.
4. See Table 1 in Where Is Jerusalem?.
5. See Table 1 in Where Is Jerusalem?.
6. See Israel’s Vision of a Greater [Jewish] Jerusalem
7. See Where Is Jerusalem?.
Four prominent Palestinian Jerusalemites share their thoughts about how the Oslo Accords devastated East Jerusalem.
An interactive map of Greater (Jewish) Jerusalem as envisioned by Israel