Jerusalem

The Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its... initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik. The site's significance stems from religious traditions regarding the rock, known as the Foundation Stone, at its heart. The Dome of the Rock is located at the visual center of a platform known as the Temple Mount. It was constructed on the site of the Second Jewish Temple, which was destroyed during the Roman Siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE. In 637 CE, Jerusalem surrendered to the Rashidun Caliphate army during the Muslim conquest of Syria. The location of the Dome of the Rock was established as the site of the Islamic miracle of the Isra and Miraj by Caliph Omar ibn al Khattab, who was advised by his associate, Ka'ab al-Ahbar, a former Jewish rabbi who had converted to Islam, that Isra and Miraj took place at the site of the former Jewish Temples. The Dome of the Rock was erected between 689 and 691 CE.
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The Western Wall, Wailing Wall or Kotel , translit.: HaKotel HaMa'aravi; Ashkenazic pronunciation: Kosel; Arabic: حائط... البراق‎, translit.: Ḥā'iṭ Al-Burāq, translat.: The Buraq Wall is located in the Old City of Jerusalem at the foot of the western side of the Temple Mount. It is a remnant of the ancient wall that surrounded the Jewish Temple's courtyard, and is one of the most sacred sites in Judaism outside of the Temple Mount itself. Just over half the wall, including its 17 courses located below street level, dates from the end of the Second Temple period, commonly believed to have been constructed around 19 BCE by Herod the Great, but recent excavations indicate that the works were not finished during Herod's lifetime. The remaining layers were added from the 7th century onwards. The Western Wall refers not only to the exposed section facing a large plaza in the Jewish Quarter, but also to the sections concealed behind structures running along the whole length of the Temple Mount, such as the Little Western Wall–a 25 ft section in the Muslim Quarter.
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The Monastery of the Cross is an Orthodox monastery near the Nayot neighborhood of Jerusalem, Israel. It is located in the Valley of the Cross,... below the Israel Museum and the Knesset. The monastery was built in the 11th century, during the reign of King Bagrat IV by the Georgian Giorgi-Prokhore of Shavsheti. It is believed that the site was originally consecrated in the 4th century under the instruction of the Roman emperor Constantine the Great, who later gave the site to the Georgian King Mirian III of Iberia after the conversion of his country to Christianity in 327 A.D. Legend has it that the monastery was erected on the burial spot of Adam's head — though two other locations in Jerusalem also claim this honor — from which grew the tree that gave its wood to the cross on which Christ was crucified. Due to heavy debt the monastery was sold by the Georgians to the Greeks in 1685. It is currently occupied by monks of the Jerusalem Patriarchate. The remains of the crusader period monastery forms a small part of the current complex, most of which has undergone restoration and rebuilding.
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The Tower of David is an ancient citadel located near the Jaffa Gate entrance to the Old City of Jerusalem. Built to strengthen a strategically weak... point in the Old City's defenses, the citadel that stands today was constructed during the 2nd century BC and subsequently destroyed and rebuilt by, in succession, the Christian, Muslim, Mamluk, and Ottoman conquerors of Jerusalem. It contains important archaeological finds dating back 2,700 years, and is a popular venue for benefit events, craft shows, concerts, and sound-and-light performances. The name "Tower of David" is due to Byzantine Christians who believed the site to be the palace of King David. During the 2nd century BC, the Old City of Jerusalem expanded onto the so-called Western Hill. This 773-meter-high prominence, which comprises the modern Armenian and Jewish Quarters as well as Mount Zion, was bounded by steep valleys on all sides except for its northwest corner. After King David and his son the legendary King Solomon's initial fortifications, King Hezekiah may have been the first to specifically fortify this area.
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The Israel Museum, Jerusalem was founded in 1965 as Israel's national museum. It is situated on a hill in the Givat Ram neighborhood of Jerusalem,... near the Bible Lands Museum, the Knesset, the Israeli Supreme Court, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. A uniquely designed building on the grounds of the museum, the Shrine of the Book, houses the Dead Sea Scrolls and artifacts discovered at Masada. Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kollek was the driving spirit behind the establishment of the museum, one of the leading art and archaeology museums in the world. The Israel Museum is the largest cultural institution in the State of Israel and is ranked among the world’s leading art and archaeology museums. The Museum houses encyclopedic collections, including works dating from prehistory to the present day, in its Archaeology, Fine Arts, and Jewish Art and Life Wings, and features the most extensive holdings of biblical and Holy Land archaeology in the world.
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The Shrine of the Book , a wing of the Israel Museum near Givat Ram in Jerusalem, houses the Dead Sea Scrolls—discovered 1947–56 in 11... caves in and around the Wadi Qumran. Initially, it was intended to build the shrine on the Givat Ram campus of the Hebrew University, adjoining the National Library. An elaborate planning process of seven years led to the building's eventual construction in 1965, funded by the family of David Samuel Gottesman, the Hungarian émigré and philanthropist who had purchased the scrolls as a gift to the State of Israel. One of the architects—the pragmatic Armand Phillip Bartos — was evidently chosen based on his being married to Gottesman's daughter Celeste Ruth Gottesman . For the other appointed architect—the eccentric visionary Frederick John Kiesler —Gottesman had earlier funded a fact-finding project to discover if Kiesler's "Endless House" could be installed at The Museum of Modern Art in New York City. The architectural team also included Gezer Heller, who went on to build many important structures in the new State of Israel.
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The Rockefeller Museum, formerly the Palestine Archaeological Museum, is an archaeological museum located in East Jerusalem that houses a large... collection of artifacts unearthed in the excavations conducted in Mandate Palestine, in the 1920s and 1930s. The museum is under the management of the Israel Museum and houses the head office of the Israel Antiquities Authority. In 1906, the Jewish National Fund planned to purchase a site known as Karm el-Sheikh to house the Bezalel School of Art and Crafts. The founder of the school, Boris Schatz envisaged a museum and university that would overlook the Temple Mount. In 1919, British Mandate authorities designated the site for an archaeological museum. Visiting Palestine in 1925, during the days of the British Mandate, James Henry Breasted, founder and director of the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute, decided that Jerusalem needed an archaeological museum to house important regional finds. Encouraged by Lord Plumer, the British High Commissioner, Breasted approached American philanthropist John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who agreed to donate two million dollars toward the project.
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The L.A. Mayer Institute for Islamic Art is a museum in Jerusalem, Israel, established in 1974. It is located in Katamon, down the road from the... Jerusalem Theater. The museum houses Islamic pottery, textiles, jewelry, ceremonial objects and other Islamic cultural artifacts. It is not to be confused with the Islamic Museum, Jerusalem. The museum was founded by Vera Bryce Salomons, daughter of Sir David Lionel Salomons, in memory of her professor, Leo Aryeh Mayer, rector of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, a scholar of Islamic art who died in 1959. It has nine galleries organized in chronological order, exploring the beliefs and art of Islamic civilization. In addition to Mayer's private collection, the museum houses antique chess pieces, dominoes and playing cards; daggers, swords, helmets; textiles; jewelry; glassware, pottery and metalware produced in Islamic countries, from Spain to India. A collection of Islamic carpets was added in 1999. A gallery in the museum also displays the David Salomons clock and watch collection. Salomons was the nephew of the first Jewish Lord Mayor of London.
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Yitzhak Rabin was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office,... 1974–77 and 1992 until his assassination in 1995. In 1994, Rabin won the Nobel Peace Prize together with Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat. He was assassinated by right-wing Israeli radical Yigal Amir, who was opposed to Rabin's signing of the Oslo Accords. Rabin was the first native-born prime minister of Israel, the only prime minister to be assassinated and the second to die in office after Levi Eshkol. Rabin was born in Jerusalem, British Mandate of Palestine to Nehemiah and Rosa , two immigrants of the Third Aliyah, the third wave of Jewish immigration to Israel from Europe. Nehemiah Rubitzov was born in the Ukrainian village Sydorovychi near Ivankiv in 1886. His father died when he was a child, and he worked to support his family from a young age. At the age of 18, he emigrated to the United States, where he joined the Poale Zion party and changed his surname to Rabin.
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Amos Kollek is an Israeli film director, writer and actor. Amos Kollek was born in Jerusalem. He is the son of Teddy Kollek, the long-time mayor of... Jerusalem. Kollek studied psychology and philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He became interested in film after working as a writer. He produced his first film, Goodbye New York, in 1985. His film Fast Food Fast Women was entered into the 2000 Cannes Film Festival.
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Eliahu Inbal is an Israeli conductor. Inbal studied violin at the Israeli Academy of Music and took composition lessons with Paul Ben-Haim. Upon... hearing him there, Leonard Bernstein endorsed a scholarship for Inbal to study conducting at the Conservatoire de Paris, and he also took courses with Sergiu Celibidache and Franco Ferrara in Hilversum, Netherlands. At Novara, he won first prize at the 1963 Guido Cantelli conducting competition. Inbal made most of his early appearances in Italy, but a successful British debut in 1965 with the London Philharmonic led to a number of other engagements with British orchestras. He subsequently worked with a number of orchestras throughout Europe and in America, and eventually took joint British citizenship. From 1974 to 1990, he was the principal conductor of the hr-Sinfonieorchester in Frankfurt. With them, he was the first to record the original versions of several of Anton Bruckner's symphonies, for which he won the Jahrespreis der deutschen Schallplatten-Kritik. He also recorded a complete cycle of the symphonies of Gustav Mahler and Shostakovich.
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Avishai Cohen is an Israeli jazz bassist, composer, singer and arranger. Avishai grew up in a musical family at Kibbutz Kabri, Northern Israel. He... began playing the piano at 9 years old, but changed to the bass guitar at the age of 14, inspired by legendary bassist Jaco Pastorius. Later, after playing in an Army band for two years, he began studying upright bass with maestro Michael Klinghoffer. Two years later moved to New York City, and got in contact with other jazz players. At the beginning of his stay there he had to struggle, working in jobs like construction. According to him his first year there was the most difficult year of his life, having to play bass in the streets, subways and parks. He studied music at Mannes College The New School for Music, and after playing Latin jazz in a few bands in his student years, Cohen was approached by pianist Danilo Pérez to join his trio. After a long period of performing in small clubs, Cohen got a phone call from the jazz pianist Chick Corea and was given a record contract.
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Brian George is a British-Israeli actor and voice actor for Indian accents, who typically plays guest roles for characters of South Asian descent.... Perhaps his most famous role is as Pakistani restaurateur Babu Bhatt on Seinfeld or as the New Delhi gynecologist father of Rajesh Koothrappali on The Big Bang Theory. George was born in Jerusalem, Israel, to Iraqi Jewish parents who had immigrated to Israel from India. His mother was born in India and his father was born in Lebanon but raised in Bombay. A year after his birth, the family moved from Israel to London, and then to Toronto, Ontario in 1966. George is the youngest of four siblings. He attended an all-boys school in London, but made the switch to a public co-ed high school when the family moved to Toronto. He attended the University of Toronto, where he was active in the university's theater productions. George left before graduation and formed a theater group; unsuccessful, he moved on to join The Second City, where he trained with John Candy, among others. George appeared as a United Nations secretary on Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.
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Yasmin Levy , born on December 23, 1975 in Jerusalem, is an Israeli singer-songwriter of Judaeo-Spanish music. Her late father, Yitzhak Levy , was a... composer and cantor, pioneer researcher into the long and rich history of the Ladino music and culture of Spanish Jewry and its diaspora, being the editor of the Ladino language magazine Aki Yerushalayim. With her distinctive and emotive style, Yasmin has brought a new interpretation to the medieval Ladino/Judeo-Spanish song by incorporating more "modern" sounds of Andalusian Flamenco and Persian, as well as combining instruments like the darbuka, oud, violin, cello, and piano. In her second album, La Judería , she also covered the popular songs Gracias a la Vida by Violeta Parra and Nací en Alamó from the film Vengo, directed by Tony Gatlif, which in its original version won the 2001 César Award for Best Music Written for a Film .
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Yitzhak Rabin was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office,... 1974–77 and 1992 until his assassination in 1995. In 1994, Rabin won the Nobel Peace Prize together with Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat. He was assassinated by right-wing Israeli radical Yigal Amir, who was opposed to Rabin's signing of the Oslo Accords. Rabin was the first native-born prime minister of Israel, the only prime minister to be assassinated and the second to die in office after Levi Eshkol. Rabin was born in Jerusalem, British Mandate of Palestine to Nehemiah and Rosa , two immigrants of the Third Aliyah, the third wave of Jewish immigration to Israel from Europe. Nehemiah Rubitzov was born in the Ukrainian village Sydorovychi near Ivankiv in 1886. His father died when he was a child, and he worked to support his family from a young age. At the age of 18, he emigrated to the United States, where he joined the Poale Zion party and changed his surname to Rabin.
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Amos Kollek is an Israeli film director, writer and actor. Amos Kollek was born in Jerusalem. He is the son of Teddy Kollek, the long-time mayor of... Jerusalem. Kollek studied psychology and philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He became interested in film after working as a writer. He produced his first film, Goodbye New York, in 1985. His film Fast Food Fast Women was entered into the 2000 Cannes Film Festival.
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Anat Elimelech was an Israeli actress and model who played in commercials and television shows for children. In 1997, Elimelech was murdered by her... boyfriend, David Afuta, who then committed suicide.
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Eliahu Inbal is an Israeli conductor. Inbal studied violin at the Israeli Academy of Music and took composition lessons with Paul Ben-Haim. Upon... hearing him there, Leonard Bernstein endorsed a scholarship for Inbal to study conducting at the Conservatoire de Paris, and he also took courses with Sergiu Celibidache and Franco Ferrara in Hilversum, Netherlands. At Novara, he won first prize at the 1963 Guido Cantelli conducting competition. Inbal made most of his early appearances in Italy, but a successful British debut in 1965 with the London Philharmonic led to a number of other engagements with British orchestras. He subsequently worked with a number of orchestras throughout Europe and in America, and eventually took joint British citizenship. From 1974 to 1990, he was the principal conductor of the hr-Sinfonieorchester in Frankfurt. With them, he was the first to record the original versions of several of Anton Bruckner's symphonies, for which he won the Jahrespreis der deutschen Schallplatten-Kritik. He also recorded a complete cycle of the symphonies of Gustav Mahler and Shostakovich.
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Mili Avital is an Israeli actress. Avital built a successful stage and film career in Israel, winning the Israeli Academy Award for Best Supporting... Actress in 1992 and nominated for Best Actress in 1994. Avital was born in Jerusalem, the daughter of graphic designers Noni and Iko Avital. She was raised in Tel Aviv and Ra'anana. She attended the Thelma Yellin High School of Arts in Giv'atayim. She moved to New York in 1994, and later dated David Schwimmer in the early 2000s. Avital continues to reside in New York City with her husband, screenwriter Charles Randolph , and their son. As one of the most highly regarded actresses in her native Israel, Avital has created international success with her diverse starring roles in film, television and theater. She began her professional career during her senior year in high school, in the play Dangerous Liaisons at the Cameri Theater in Tel Aviv. In 1993 she arrived in New York City to study acting at the "Circle in the Square Theatre School".
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Brian George is a British-Israeli actor and voice actor for Indian accents, who typically plays guest roles for characters of South Asian descent.... Perhaps his most famous role is as Pakistani restaurateur Babu Bhatt on Seinfeld or as the New Delhi gynecologist father of Rajesh Koothrappali on The Big Bang Theory. George was born in Jerusalem, Israel, to Iraqi Jewish parents who had immigrated to Israel from India. His mother was born in India and his father was born in Lebanon but raised in Bombay. A year after his birth, the family moved from Israel to London, and then to Toronto, Ontario in 1966. George is the youngest of four siblings. He attended an all-boys school in London, but made the switch to a public co-ed high school when the family moved to Toronto. He attended the University of Toronto, where he was active in the university's theater productions. George left before graduation and formed a theater group; unsuccessful, he moved on to join The Second City, where he trained with John Candy, among others. George appeared as a United Nations secretary on Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.
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