The Earth is filled with ancient cities where human civilization has completed its existence and ensured its continuity since the beginning of human history. Humanity has established its life journey through cities and civilizations. To build a city is to build a civilization. Establishing a civilization requires a challenging and laborious experience. Thus, cities created by humans are places where a nation’s spirit, life experiences, material and spiritual culture reside and dominate. Every city has a soul. The religious and national values of the communities that dominate the city give it meaning and elevate it.
Jerusalem is one of the rare ancient cities built on Earth that has not lost its value and significance for centuries. What makes Jerusalem meaningful and important is not only the sanctity attributed to it by the Abrahamic religions, including Islam, but also its political, social, and economic aspects.
Throughout history, Jerusalem has been a host to many different religious and ethnic elements, and it has been a city where numerous ancient cultures coexist. With its material and spiritual wealth, it has been a city that many rulers and states wanted to possess and govern, and they engaged in serious struggles for this purpose.
The ancient city of Jerusalem bears the traces of the three major Abrahamic religions. For Muslims, it is the first qibla (direction of prayer), for Jews, it is the center of the Temple of Solomon, and for Christians, it is the center of the world and the place where the Messiah will return.
Throughout history, Jerusalem has been destroyed twice, occupied 23 times, attacked 52 times, and captured and recaptured 44 times. It is a city with a tumultuous history.
Muslims conquered Jerusalem in 638. According to tradition, the bishop of Jerusalem, Sophronius, declared that he would only hand over the keys of the city to the caliph, upon which Caliph Umar personally came to Jerusalem to take possession of the city. The “Fatha of Umar,” known as the “Umar Decree” in history, which exemplifies religious freedom and tolerance, was promulgated here.
Under Muslim rule, Jerusalem experienced its brightest period. During the Umayyad period, after Caliph Muawiyah moved the capital to Damascus, the importance of Jerusalem increased even more. The city was developed by Muslims, equipped with all the facilities befitting its history and glory. The most important construction activity was undoubtedly the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, which were built during the Umayyad period and repaired and reconstructed during this time.
After the Battle of Manzikert, the Muslim Turkish presence that gained strength in Anatolia caused great concern and panic, primarily for the Roman Empire and the Church, leading to the initiation of what would be known in history as the Crusades. They formed the most magnificent armies that history has ever seen, consisting of citizens of all European nations, equipped with unprecedented resources. The main goal of this magnificent army was to end the Turkish presence in Anatolia and to recapture their ancient holy cities, especially Jerusalem, from the Muslims.
On July 15, 1099, the Crusaders captured Jerusalem, establishing a Latin Kingdom and a church affiliated with the papacy. The Crusaders killed every man, woman, and child in the city, especially in homes and mosques. They slaughtered the people who had taken refuge in the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The historian Raimundus, who witnessed this massacre, described how he had to pass through piles of corpses and pools of blood up to his knees as he walked to the area of the sanctuaries. Although the exact number of casualties in the massacre is not known, contemporary sources indicate that almost the entire Muslim and Jewish population was killed. The rule of the Latin Kingdom represented one of the darkest periods in Jerusalem’s history.
Muslims launched numerous military campaigns and sieges to reclaim the city. There were numerous individual clashes between Muslims and the Kingdom’s army. Finally, after the Kingdom’s soldiers attacked a Muslim caravan, Salah ad-Din, also known as Saladin, became impatient and, on July 4, 1187, he destroyed the Kingdom’s army in the Battle of Hattin and marched on Jerusalem.
During this campaign, Saladin’s words reflecting the historical and religious significance of Jerusalem have been immortalized: “I have a great belief that Jerusalem is one of the places that Allah has deemed sacred. I do not want to besiege this holy city, which you also hold sacred, and attack and enter it by the means required by war.”
Under the rule of Salah ad-Din, peace and prosperity returned to Jerusalem. The city regained its social, political, and economic stability of old. Thus, after about 145 years, the city returned to the hands of the Muslims.
In the following years, despite changing hands several times between the Ayyubids and the Mamluks, another Turkish state that ruled in Syria, Jerusalem was ultimately handed over to the Mamluks through a peace treaty brokered by the Abbasid Caliph al-Musta’sim-Billah. The Mamluks’ policy towards Jerusalem followed a similar course as previous Muslim states. The Mamluks stamped the city with the Turkish-Islamic seal, providing all the necessary resources for its restoration and revival.
By the 16th century, the Ottoman Empire, at its zenith, and its famous ruler, Sultan Selim I (Yavuz Sultan Selim), embarked on a campaign to Egypt. After his victory against the Mamluks in the Battle of Marj Dabiq, Jerusalem fell into the hands of the Ottoman Turks. Jerusalem remained under Ottoman rule for about four centuries, during which the Ottomans, recognizing its historical importance, provided the necessary support and care.
However, in the 20th century, with the unfavorable outcome of World War I and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, “Mandatory Rule” was established in Jerusalem. The Jewish population’s migration to this region and the city accelerated, and with the subsequent issuance of the Balfour Declaration, Jewish political presence in this region was supported by Britain.
From that point on, Jerusalem acquired the status of a city plagued by ongoing problems that would continue to the present day. The Muslim population was forced to migrate, Muslim places of worship were damaged, and the incessant oppression by Israel turned Jerusalem into a painful homeland.
Jerusalem, especially for Muslims, awaits once again the bright and prosperous days of its history under Muslim rule.
