Moroccan Quarter - History

History

The quarter was donated to and mainly inhabited by people of Moroccan descent, who held on to their culture in the way of food, clothing and traditions until the neighborhood became assimilated with the rest of the Old City in the 19th century. Thus it also became a natural place of stay to Moroccans who came on pilgrimage to the al-Aqsa Mosque.

Taxation registers listed 13 households in the quarter in 1525–6, 69 households, 1 bachelor and 1 imam in 1538–9, 84 households and 11 bachelors in 1553–4, 130 households and 2 bachelors in 1562–3, and 126 households and 7 bachelors in 1596–7.

Over the years a small number of schools, scientific institutions and mosques were established in the quarter and it became home to Muslim clerics who performed religious duties at the al-Aqsa Mosque. The neighborhood held the offices of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. In 1933-36, Yasser Arafat lived in the neighborhood. He and his brother were sent there to live with their uncle, Selim Abul Saoud, after his mother died.

The feature of the neighborhood that would eventually doom it was its location. Houses in the quarter were only four meters away from the sacred Western Wall (also known as the "Wailing Wall"), a remnant of the Second Temple plaza and an important place of pilgrimage for Jews. Public access to the wall was through a narrow passage from King David's Street, sometimes leading to tensions between the Jewish visitors, wanting easier access and more space, and the residents, who complained of the noise. With the onset of modern Zionism, these tensions increased.

In 1887 an attempt to buy the Moroccan Quarter was made by Baron Rothschild who conceived a plan to purchase and demolish the quarter as "a merit and honor to the Jewish People." The proposed purchase was considered and approved by the Ottoman Governor of Jerusalem, Rauf Pasha, and by the Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammed Tahir Husseini. Even after permission was obtained from the highest secular and Muslim religious authority to proceed, the transaction was shelved after the authorities insisted that after demolishing the quarter no construction of any type could take place there, only trees could be planted to beautify the area. Additionally the Jews would not have full control over the area. This meant that they would have no power to stop people from using the plaza for various activities, including the driving of mules, which would cause a disturbance to worshippers. Other reports place the scheme's failure on Jewish infighting as to whether the plan would foster a detrimental Arab reaction.

In the first two months following the Ottoman Empire’s entry into the First World War, the Turkish governor of Jerusalem, Zakey Bey, offered to sell the Moroccan Quarter, which consisted of about 25 houses, to the Jews in order to enlarge the area available to them for prayer. He requested a sum of £20,000 which would be used to both rehouse the Muslim families and to create a public garden in front of the Wall. However, the Jews of the city lacked the necessary funds.

In 1918 the influential Jewish leader Chaim Weizmann sent a letter to the British Foreign Office asking for the quarter to be removed and the wall placed under Jewish ownership; however, the British maintained the status quo ante, and the wall as well as the Moroccan Quarter remained Waqf property, while Jews retained their longstanding right to visit it. After the 1929 Palestine riots, Great Britain appointed a commission under the approval of the League of Nations to settle the issue. The Commission again reaffirmed the status quo, while placing certain restrictions on activities, including forbidding Jews from conducting the Yom Kippur prayers, which involved the blowing of the Shofar, and Muslims from carrying out the Zikr ceremony (the playing of music) close to the wall or to cause annoyance to the Jews.

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War Israeli and Jordanian forces fought in the area until the former were defeated and expelled along with 1,500 Jewish civilians from the adjacent Jewish Quarter. After having been largely destroyed during the war, the quarter, with the rest of the Old City, passed into the hands of Jordan.