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Claire Marie Kuhn

Professor Yacine Daddi Addoun

HIST 30077-01 Trade and Migrations in the Lands of Islam

May 12, 2017

Jerusalem: The Crusade for An International City

In the lands of Islam, there are few cities more important than Jerusalem. The holy city

has been a hub of religious and economic activity for centuries. Jerusalem has been home to both

divine revelations of faith, and horrible atrocities of war. Today, Jerusalem is a vibrant, bustling

city, even in the shadow of the harsh tensions of the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Jerusalemites

are of varied national, ethnic and religious denominations and include European, Middle Eastern

and African Jews, Georgians, Armenians, and Muslim, Protestant, Greeks, Greek Orthodox

Arabs, Syrian Orthodox and Coptic Orthodox Arabs, among others. While it may seem like this

extremely international city is a new phenomena, that could not be farther from the truth.

Muslims, Arabs, and Jews alike have all inhabited the city for hundreds of years, and have lived

together in both times of harmony and of discord. This mixed history of peace and war along

religious lines, tracing all the way back to even before the legendary Crusades, is a major factor

in understanding what a future for Jerusalem might look like. How Jerusalem ought to be treated

in the face of the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and in the face of its deeply rooted history

of three clashing faiths, is of great question and debate in the international community. There is

no doubt that the complex history of the city, and the confusing legal concept of “international

city” status must be taken into account when making decisions of sovereignty surrounding

Jerusalem. It is due to these realities that the only future for Jerusalem is one of an independent,
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international entity that is monitored by a “fourth” party, a completely secular, impartial party,

such as the United Nations, without ties to the Arab, Christian, or Jewish tradition.

Control of Jerusalem has transferred hand often throughout history, but it’s religious past

and strong faith traditions have never wavered in their deep hold on the city. The scholar Evan

Wilson wrote that “just as Palestine is the Holy Land of three world religions, so is Jerusalem the

Holy City of each three” (1). In this one city, Abraham sacrificed Isaac, David established his

capital, and Solomon, Zerubbabel, and Herod built their temples. All of these occurrences are of

great importance to the Jewish people and their faith. For Christians, it is seen as the place where

Jesus both lived and died, and where the first sects of Christianity emerged. Muslims take

interest in the holy city due to the fact that it was the place where Muhammad journeyed to

heaven, and it is the place of the final judgement. While these are simply the overarching

religious beliefs regarding the city, even more can be said about all the different holy sites within

the city. As scholar Henry Cattan noted, “all three have ruled the city at one time or another: the

Jews for almost five centuries in biblical times, the Christians for over four hundred years in the

fourth to the seventh and the twelfth centuries, and the Muslims (Arabs and Turks) for twelve

centuries for 638 until 1917 continuously, with the exception of the period when the city was the

capital of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem”. As each group ruled the city, they created their own

holy sites in regards to their specific faith tradition, the result of which today is an intricate

framework of religious buildings and places that often correlate to more than one tradition. An

example of this is the Temple Mount, where tradition tells us Abraham prepared to sacrifice

Isaac, Jesus taught, and Muhammad departed for his journey to heaven (Wilson 1). The Temple

Mount has become a pilgrimage site with various structures to celebrate each faiths respective

traditions, and each of the three faiths stake claim on the site. On the surface, three faiths sharing
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such intimate connections to a land might be conceived as creating the possibility of them

working together in the best interests of the city. But, when one looks at the history of the city,

specifically during the period of the Christian Crusaders, it is clear that this has not been the

reality.

The Crusades demonstrate how religious fervor for a specific cause and place can lead to

unfair treatment of both the occupants of the city and the city itself. Jerusalem became merely a

city of conquest for all parties during this period, and harmony was a word unheard of. The

Crusaders were “determined to take Jerusalem by any means” and “nothing could deter them

from their objective” (Maalouf 46). Driven so intensely by their faith, the Franj refused to

cooperate with the ruler of Cairo at the time, al-Afdal, who was in occupation of Jerusalem, even

when he offered a policy on the holy city that involved freedom of worship and visitation rights

for pilgrims (Maalouf 47). The Crusader’s stubborn rejection is an early example of the fact that

when one of the religious parties seeks to hold control of the city, they are first going to act in

their own interests and ignore those of the different religious faiths. Whether it is Muslims,

Arabs, or Jews, all have fallen victim to the corrupting power of control. For example, al-Afdal

threw out Christians from the city in advance of the Crusaders’ siege so as to prevent against any

possible collusion between the coreligionists (Maalouf 48). Once they had gained control of

Jerusalem, the Crusaders were vicious in their reign. In The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, author

Amin Maalouf repeated Iln al-Athir’s narration of the events of the siege: “The population of the

holy city was put to the sword, and the Franj spent a week massacring Muslims. They killed

more than seventy thousand people in the al-Aqsa mosque… the Jews had gathered in their

synagogue and the Franj burned them alive. They also destroyed the monuments of saints and

tombs of Abraham” (51). Not only did the Crusaders murder the citizens of Jerusalem who held
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opposing faiths, they harmed the holy sites of with which they most likely shared some regard.

Granted, this was during a time of war, but even during their occupation the Franj showed a

general disrespect for the city’s holy sites that had called them to a religious crusade in the first

place. They built a church at the Al-Asqa mosque (Maalouf 129), infringing on one of the

Muslim communities’ most holy sites. The Crusades are an extreme example of religious clashes

leading to harm on a city and its citizens, but nevertheless portray a clear example of the

complicated challenges facing such a religiously tangled city like Jerusalem.

Jerusalem has faced similar challenges of religious discrimination and conflict in modern

times. Scholar Peretz studied the treatment of religious pilgrims during the years of Jordananian

control of East Jerusalem. He noted that a limited number of Israeli Christians were able to visit

for religious devotions, but the same privilege was denied Israel’s Muslims (212). The other

side’s treatment of each other was no better, as at the time “the number of Jordanians who have

legally entered Israel is smaller than those who have visited New York” and “almost no Jewish

citizens of Israel have been permitted into Jordan”. One of the few periods where this constant

mistreatment of the minority religion (or the religion not in control of the city) was not present

was when the Ottoman Turks ruled over Jerusalem. During Turkish times in 1977, Jerusalem

was recognized as possessing “independent” status (Cattan 3). Scholar Chad Emmett stated that

“as long as no local community exercised sovereignty over the other, the Jews, Muslims, and

Christians of city coexisted in their separate quarters” (16). Emmett’s proposed solution for

peaceful control of Jerusalem traces back to this period of relative harmony between the three

religious groups. In 1852, the Ottoman Sultan Abdul Majid issued a firman on the holy places

which granted various religious communities shared rights in the holy places and stated which

areas was under whose control (Emmett 19). It came to be known as the “Status Quo” in
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Jerusalem (Emmett 20). The Status Quo involved outside rulers which came in and demarcated

territorial rights with which the participating communities had no no choice but to comply. The

relative success of the Turkish leaders firman is still seen today in the Church of the Holy

Sepulcher, as various Christian sects share the space, and at Mount Zion which is shared between

Jews, Christians, and Muslims. The key to this success is a point raised earlier in the paper: an

independent authority was in charge of both dividing up and administering rights to specific faith

parties. If one of the three faiths attempted to do this, clearly someone would be mistreated and a

clash on interests would be inevitable. History points to this fact being true.

Jerusalem, as it stands now under international law and United Nations resolutions, is a

bizarre enigma. Its status rests upon a special international regime applicable to the corpus

separatum of the City of Jerusalem as defined in resolution 181 of 1947, which envisages its

administration by the United Nations but leaves other attributes of sovereignty, mainly the

powers of legislation, taxation and the judiciary, vested in its inhabitants (Cattan 15). What does

this mean in reality? The state of Israel, and thus the Jewish faith, controls Jerusalem and in turn,

its holy sites. As Israel has control over the territory, Jerusalem is suspect to the whims of one

faith. As has been demonstrated throughout history, this is a dangerous state to leave the city in.

While right now Jerusalem may seem to be functioning, the denial of rights to religious

minorities is not an inconceivable reality. Moving forward, Jerusalem should look to the bright

spots in its past for a solution to the complicated issue of governance over the holy city. The

international community should consider it’s own version of “status quo” solution, one that

extends beyond just the holy sites to include the city at large. As long as no one religious faith is

in complete charge over the city, harmony between the intertwined Muslim, Jewish, and

Christian communities is possible and discord can be avoided.

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Works Cited

Cattan, Henry. “The Status of Jerusalem under International Law and United Nations

Resolutions.” Journal of Palestine Studies, vol. 10, no. 3, 1981, pg. 3-15.

Emmet, Chad F. “The Status Quo Solution for Jerusalem.” Journal of Palestine Studies, vol. 26,

no. 2, 1997, pg. 16-28.

Maalouf, Amin. 1984. The Crusades Through Arab Eyes. New York: Schocken Books.

Peretz, Don. “Jerusalem- A Divided City.” Journal of International Affairs, vol. 18, no. 2, 1964,

pg. 211-220.

Wilson, Evan M. “The Internationalization of Jerusalem.” Middle East Journal, vol. 23, no.1,

1969, pg. 1-13.