East Jerusalem Attractions

You can probably cover the major sights of East Jerusalem in half a day. As you go along Saladin Street from the north, toward the Old City walls, you'll pass the Ministry of Justice on the right. Farther down, across the street in a tree-shaded compound, is the famed Albright Institute of Archaeological Research. Just past it on the left, you'll find Az-Zahra Street, a modern thoroughfare of clothing and appliance stores, bookshops, restaurants, and hotels, leading to the Rockefeller Museum.

Mount of Olives, Mount Scopus & Valley of Kidron

You can reach the Mount of Olives Road either by driving north up Saladin Street or by taking a left turn at the wall, just past the Rockefeller museum. For Hebrew University Mount Scopus campus, take bus no. 4A, 9, or 28 from downtown West Jerusalem.

Mount Scopus -- From Sheikh Jarrah (on Nablus Rd.), the road heads past the Mount Scopus Hotel and proceeds, gradually curving, past Shepherds Hotel. At the bend in Mount Scopus Road, to your left, you'll see the Jerusalem War Cemetery, the resting place for British World War I dead. You are now on Mount Scopus-Har Hatsofim, which means "Mount of Observation." It was here that the Roman armies of Titus and Vespasian camped in A.D. 70 and observed the city under siege as they planned their final attack.

About 90m (295 ft.) down the ridge, you'll find the Mount Scopus Hadassah Hospital on the left. The Hebrew University on Mount Scopus, which opened on April 1, 1925, is now one of the largest institutions of higher learning in the Middle East. It is mostly housed in a vast fortresslike megacomplex designed by David Reznik. The design seems to reflect the university's past experience. At the end of the War of Independence in 1949, the cease-fire lines found Israeli defenders still holding out at Hebrew University and Hadassah Hospital, two important Jewish institutions deep in the heart of Jordanian-controlled East Jerusalem. For the next 19 years, these two bastions were resupplied by monthly Red Cross convoys, and a new Hadassah Hospital and Hebrew University had to be built in West Jerusalem. Since 1967, the hospital and campus have been restored to their original functions and greatly enlarged. From the Truman Research Institute (a pink stone building) there's a sweeping view of both the New and Old cities. Tours are conducted Sunday to Friday at 11am from the Sherman Building.

Views of Jerusalem -- The road skirting the ridge proceeds past the high-towered Augusta Victoria Hospital -- an Arab Legion bastion during the Six-Day War -- the Arab village of Et-Tur, the Mount of Olives, the Jewish Cemetery, and the Seven Arches Hotel. The best views of Jerusalem are from Hebrew University on Mount Scopus, the Jewish graveyard on the Mount of Olives, and the Seven Arches Hotel. For optimum viewing and photographs, come in the morning, when the sun is behind you.

Mount of Olives -- Here you'll find six churches and one of the oldest Jewish cemeteries in the world. It was this cemetery that religious Jews had in mind when they came to die in the Holy Land through the start of the 20th century. Start down the path on the right, and you'll come to the Tombs of the Prophets, believed to be the burial place of Haggai, Malachi, and Zechariah. Many Jews have believed, and perhaps still do, that from here the route to heaven is the shortest, since God's presence is always hovering over Jerusalem; others have held that here, on the Mount of Olives, the resurrection of the dead will occur.

Farther up the road, on the southern fringe of Et-Tur, stands the Mosque (and Chapel) of the Ascension (ring the doorbell for admission), marking the spot where Jesus ascended to heaven. Interestingly, this Christian shrine is under Muslim control. Muslims revere Jesus as a prophet. However, they do not believe Jesus to be the son of God, nor do they believe that Jesus died on the cross.

Just a few steps away is the Church of the Pater Noster, built on the traditional spot where Jesus instructed his disciples in the Lord's Prayer. Tiles along the walls of the church are inscribed with the Lord's Prayer in 44 languages. The Carmelite Convent and Basilica of the Sacred Heart are on the adjoining hill.

From up here you can see a cluster of churches on the lower slopes of the Mount of Olives. All can be reached either from here or from the road paralleling the fortress wall, diagonally opposite Saint Stephen's Gate (Lion's Gate).

If you head down the path to the right of the Tomb of the Prophets, you'll come to Dominus Flevit (daily 8am-noon and 2:30-5pm), which is a relatively contemporary Franciscan church that marks the spot where Jesus wept over his vision of the future destruction of Jerusalem. Next, the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene, with its onion-shaped spires, was built in 1888 by Czar Alexander III (Tues and Thurs 10-11:30am). Call tel. 02/628-4371 for more information.

The Roman Catholic Garden of Gethsemane (Apr-Oct daily 8:30am-noon and 3pm-sunset; in winter daily 8:30am-noon and 2pm-sunset) adjoins the Basilica of the Agony (Church of All Nations); it's in the courtyard where Jesus supposedly prayed the night before his arrest. The church's gold mosaic facade shows God looking down from heaven over Jesus and the peoples of the world. The church was built by people from 16 different nations in 1924. Next door, past beautifully tended gardens of ancient olive trees and bougainvillea, is the Tomb of the Virgin, which is a deep underground chamber housing the tombs of Mary and Joseph. The tomb is open daily 8am to noon and 2:30 to 5:30pm.

Valley of Kidron -- The Valley of Kidron is between the Mount of Olives and the Old City walls. It runs south, between Mount Ophel (where David built his city) and the Mount of Contempt. Just under the wall here, roughly in front of Al Aqsa Mosque, are two tombs: Absalom's Tomb and the Tomb of Zechariah. At one time, religious Jews would throw stones at Absalom's tomb (Kever Avshalom) in condemnation of Absalom, who rebelled against his father, King David. Scholars attribute Absalom's Tomb to Herodian times -- it is Jerusalem's only relatively intact structure from before the Roman destruction in A.D. 70.

The Valley of Kidron is also known as the Valley of Jehoshaphat. The Book of Joel records that the judgments will be rendered here on resurrection day: "Let the heathen be awakened, and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat, for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about." Muslims hold to a similar belief. They believe Muhammad will sit astride a pillar under the wall of the Dome of the Rock. A wire will be stretched from the pillar to the Mount of Olives, opposite, where Jesus will be seated. All humankind will walk across the wire on its way to eternity. The righteous and faithful will reach the other side safely; the rest will drop down in the Valley of Jehoshaphat and perish.

About 180m (591 ft.) down the valley is the Fountain of the Virgin, at the Arab village of Silwan. Water from the spring (the Gihon) anointed Solomon king and served as the only water source for ancient Jerusalem. During the Assyrian and Babylonian attacks (8th c. B.C.), King Hezekiah constructed an aqueduct through which the waters could be hidden inside the city, an extraordinary engineering feat at the time. Hezekiah's Aqueduct is still there (underneath the church commemorating the spot where Mary once drew water to wash the clothes of Jesus). It's about 480m (1,575 ft.) long, and the depth of the water is from .5 to 1m (1 1/2 ft.-3 ft.). The walk takes about 40 minutes; take a flashlight or a candle with you. You can walk through from Sunday to Thursday between 8:30am and 3pm, on Friday and holiday eves until 1pm. Entrance is free, but give the caretaker a tip. It is best to visit Silwan and Hezekiah's tunnel with a tour group. Above the Gihon Spring lie the ruins of King David's city.

The Peoples' Princess

Among the thousands of people who have found their final resting place on the Mount of Olives, one of the most recent and unusual is Princess Alice of Greece, mother of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and mother-in-law of Queen Elizabeth II. Born in Windsor Castle in 1885, the great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria, Princess Alice at an early age was diagnosed as being almost totally deaf. Carefully trained in lip reading, she was fluent in both English and French; later in life she also mastered Greek.

In 1903, Princess Alice married Prince Andrew, son of King George of Greece, and devoted her life to helping others. During the 1912 Balkan War, she worked as a nurse close to the battlefront, caring for sick and wounded Greek soldiers. During this time, both the princess and King George stayed in the home of the family of Haim Cohen, in the northern Greek city of Trikkala, near the war zone. Alice was fascinated by the family's warmth and traditions. The princess's friendship continued when Cohen later became a member of the Greek parliament. By the late 1930s, the Greek royal family was no longer in power, but Princess Alice remained in Athens, wearing the habit of a nun as she became increasingly committed to a life of religion and charitable work.

In 1943, during the Nazi occupation of Greece, Princess Alice learned that the widow and children of Haim Cohen were desperately trying to escape deportation to the death camps in Poland. At the risk of her life and with the help of two servants, Princess Alice hid her Jewish friends on the grounds of the royal palace in Athens for 13 months until Greece was liberated. Princess Alice died at Buckingham Palace in 1969, and in 1988, in accordance with her dying wish, was reinterred at the Church of St. Mary Magdalene on the Mount of Olives. In 1994, Prince Philip and his sister, Princess Sophie, traveled to Jerusalem to receive Yad VaShem's Medal of Honor of Righteous Among the Nations, awarded to their late mother. A tree in memory of Princess Alice has been planted at Yad VaShem.