Katamon
Katamon or Qatamon, officially known as Gonen, is a neighborhood in south-central Jerusalem. It is built next to an old Greek Orthodox monastery, believed to have been constructed on the home and the tomb of Simeon from the Gospel of Luke.
The neighborhood was established in the early 1900s, shortly before World War I, as a wealthy, predominantly Palestinian Christian neighborhood. During the 1947–48 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, the local population fled the intense fighting in the area and were not allowed to return by the new Israeli state. Instead Katamon was soon repopulated by Jewish refugees.
Geography
Katamon is bounded by the neighborhoods of Talbiya in the northeast and the German Colony and Greek Colony to the southeast. The neighbourhood is bounded on its south side by Rachel Imenu street and Hizkiyahu Ha'Melech street, and on its east side by Kovshey Katamon street. These streets connect to Emek Refaim and HaPalmach Street, respectively. During the British Mandate era, the neighborhood was divided into Upper Katamon and Lower Katamon.Street names
During the British Mandate era the streets of Katamon had no names, with the exception of two: "Katamon" street and "Jorden" street which was nicknamed "Michael Sansour" street, after a wealthy contractor whose house was in the street. The buildings were not numbered and were named after the families who built them. After Israel's independence the streets were named based on subjects such as the 1948 war, biblical and rabbinic characters, and Zionist figures.History
Antiquity
From the late fourteenth century, the location of Katamon seem to have been identified with the home of Simeon from the Gospel of Luke, the Jerusalemite who first recognised the infant Jesus as "the Lord's Christ", i.e. the promised Messiah.Ottoman era
In 1524, after the Ottoman Turks conquered the region from the Mamluks, it was reported that a church of St. Simeon, previously held by the Georgians, was now empty in the wake of Muslim attacks. In 1681 Cornelis de Bruijn made an engraving of Jerusalem, which suggested that there was an L-shaped, four-story-high tower in Katamon, confirming an early seventeenth-century source which mentioned a "house and tower" of "Simeon the prophet". The Greek Orthodox acquired the site in 1859 and in 1881 they built there a new church and residence for their Patriarch, incorporating the older ruins. The Greek Orthodox call it "St. Symeon of Katamonas" and believe that it is built over the tomb of Simeon, with an inscription in a cave on the grounds interpreted to indicate that it was the tomb of Simeon's priestly forefathers. In 1890 the Greek–Orthodox patriarch Nicodemus I of Jerusalem built his summer house near the monastery.The neighborhood began to develop in the late Ottoman era, in the early 1900s. According to Israeli geographer Gideon Biger, Katamon was probably planned before World War I. The lands in Katamon, like in nearby Talbiya and Baka, were owned by the Greek Orthodox Church of Jerusalem. In the late nineteenth century the church had a financial crisis which worsened during World War I. The Church sold, shortly before the war, some of its estate outside of the Old City, which were deemed as "less holy" including Katamon, which was split into plots for housing in a rural area.
German aerial photographs taken during the war show building lots demarcated by stones at Katamon in a grid plan way, and a system of dirt roads. Despite the low prices, the neighborhood did not attract Jewish buyers because the area was completely Christian, next to the Greek Colony, German Colony and Baka. Until the war five houses were built in Katamon.
British Mandate
During the 1920s, some 90 new residential plots were planned in Katamon and their construction began shortly after the war, especially after 1924. In a short time, some 40 luxurious buildings were built in the neighborhood, by Christian–Arab families. The buildings were built in plan for different blocs and not for the entire neighborhood. About half of Katamon's buildings were built between 1927 and 1937, and the rest were built until 1948. Most of Katamon's residents were educators, teachers, businessmen, contractors, traders and other professionals from the upper and middle class. Along with private houses, apartment buildings were built for the purpose of rent.The neighborhood developed into a prosperous, bourgeois neighborhood with a European–Cosmopolitan character whilst retaining the local, oriental culture. Most of the builders were Arab–Christians from the Greek–Orthodox community, headed by Issa Michael al-Toubbeh, but among them were some Latin rite Catholics and Armenian Protestants. A phenomenon which contributed to the neighborhood's cosmopolitan character was intermarriage between different Christian communities. The apartments were rented to Arab people and British officials, army officers and their families, who preferred to live in a Christian neighborhood.
Most of the children were sent to high quality and expensive schools, usually private ones. The schools teaching languages were usually English, Italian, German or French.
The members of the Greek–Orthodox community lived a secular lifestyle, visiting churches only on holidays and family events. They used to pray in the church of the San Simon Monastery, the church of the Monastery of the Cross or in churches in the Christian Quarter of the Old City. The Latin rite Catholic community made their prayer at the Chapel of St. Theresa in Katamon or in churches located in the Old City. Protestant families conducted their prayer at the St. George's Cathedral or in the Old City.
Many of the residents worked in British public services and many were members of YMCA. Many consulates were established in the neighborhood including the consulates of Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Italy, Belgium, Poland and Czechoslovakia. Three small hotels and a pension existed in the neighborhood before 1948 and there was a British sports club in the neighborhood, which was later used by Hapoel Jerusalem football club for a few years.
1948 war
The neighborhood was an Arab neighborhood between two Jewish neighborhoods and the only one in a line of Jewish neighborhoods.During the 1948 Palestine war Katamon was largely abandoned by its residents. The evacuation of Arabs was reported already on 10 December, and British assistance to the evacuation was reported on the beginning of January. The neighbourhood's handful of Jewish inhabitants left during the war's first weeks. According to Israeli historian Benny Morris, they left either out of fear or under Arab intimidation.
On the night of 5–6 January 1948, the Semiramis Hotel was bombed by the Haganah in Katamon, killing 24-26. After the attack many Arab residents of the neighborhood began fleeing, most of them were women, children and elders. Most fled to the Old City and some fled to the southern part of Qatamon which was around the Iraqi consulate defended by the Jordanian Arab Legion. Some of the middle-class residents found refuge in Bethlehem. The Arab authorities tried to stem the flight and many young men who fled to the Old City returned to Qatamon. Hala al-Sakakini, the daughter of Palestinian scholar and poet Khalil al-Sakakini and a resident of Katamon, described in her diary how frightened residents fled their homes and did not respond to the orders to remain. By March only a few families remained in the neighborhood, guarded by irregular forces based on San Simon Monastery.
During the war, attacks by the Arab side originated from the Greek Orthodox Saint Simeon Monastery in Katamon that was located in a strategic point overlooking the Jewish neighborhoods. On mid April the Jewish leadership halted Operation Harel near Jerusalem and ordered the Harel Brigade to deploy in the city and conduct Operation Yevusi. The reason behind the order was false reports of a fast British evacuation from the city and that the Arabs are deploying large forces in the city in order to fill the vacuum. In the battle over Katamon, which was centered around the St. Simeon monastery, most of the Arab fighters in the city participated, after they were called upon by the local militia. Fighters from the nearby Arab villages refused to send support, claiming they needed to defend themselves. The commander of the Arab forces, Ibrahim Abu-Dayyeh, was one of the prominent Arab commanders and earned respect due to his involvement during the battle over the Nabi Daniel Convoy and the battle over Sheikh Jarrah. His men were equipped with light weapons and homemade armoured vehicles as well as ones looted from the battle of Nabi Daniel. Against them were the Jewish fighters of the fourth battalion of the Harel Brigade, who were exhausted from the constant fighting in earlier battles. During the fights both sides suffered from total exhaustion. The Arabs called on the Jordanian Arab Legion to intervene but they refused. When the Arabs saw no reinforcement will arrive they decided to halt their attack and withdrew, letting to Jews take the neighborhood.
Historian Saleh Abdel Jawad wrote that "indiscriminate killings" occurred on 29 April after the neighborhood was captured by the Haganah.
The loss of the neighborhood was followed by massive looting by Jewish soldiers and civilians alike. Hagit Shlonsky, who lived nearby, wrote
For days you could see people walking by carrying looted goods.... Not only soldiers, civilians as well. They were looting like mad. They were even carrying dining tables.
Approximately 30,000 books, newspapers and manuscripts were collected by the National Library of Israel from Katamon and the other Arab neighborhoods. They were initially catalogued under their owners' names, but were later reclassified as "abandoned property".
On September 17, 1948, UN Mediator Folke Bernadotte and UN Observer André Serot, were assassinated by members of the Jewish Lehi organisation while being driven along Palmach Street, opposite the junction with Ha'gdud Ha'ivri Street, in Katamon.