From afar, the Mount of Olives seems timelessly tranquil. At dusk, the setting sun casts a golden hue on the white stone houses nestled on the mountainside. Shepherd boys herd flocks of goats across empty tracts of land and into the picturesque village of eastern Jerusalem.
But in reality, life on the Mount of Olives is not so calm. Though much of the violence related to the past six years of the Palestinian uprising has diminished over time, tensions between local Arab and Jewish residents in the area are approaching the boiling point.
At the center of the conflict is the Beit Orot Yeshiva. Established three and a half years ago by Rabbi Benny Elon, the yeshiva now wants to expand its facilities to an adjacent plot of land. The lot belongs to Irving Moskowitz, an American Jew who purchased the land in 1985.
The problem is that the municipality of Jerusalem promised local villagers years ago that a secondary school would be built on the site.
To establish their claim to the disputed lot, the yeshiva students constructed a dozen sukkahs on the site just after the Sukkot holiday. After complaints from their Arab neighbors – and threats from then Mayor Teddy Kollek – they dismantled the structures.
And although newly elected Mayor Ehud Olmert has proclaimed his support for the yeshiva and other such projects in eastern Jerusalem, he was forced to order the yeshiva to remove several newly erected mobile homes from the lot for legal reasons.
After a much-publicized standoff last week, the yeshiva complied with the order and dismantled the caravans on Monday night.
Although the land in question measures just a couple of acres all told, the issues it raises are much, much larger.
For Rabbi Elon and many other Israelis, Beit Orot and its expansion plans are an open declaration of Israel’s sovereignty over eastern Jerusalem, and the rights of Jews to live there.
For many Arabs, the yeshiva’s very presence on the mountain is a thorn in their sides – what one teen-ager called “another example of Zionist imperialism.
“This encroachment into east Jerusalem must be stopped at all costs,” she said, “or people will be killed.”
Referring to the ancient Jewish cemetery located on the Mount of Olives, Elon said, “The Jewish presence here must be more than just tombs and burial sites. We must demonstrate that this is the only capital of Israel, in the only Jewish state.”
The yeshiva, he asserted, “has a right to be here. I hope that it is the start of a continuous Jewish presence from Mount Scopus to the Mount of Olives, to Gethsemane and the Old City, all the way to Rehavia.
“Jews should feel welcome to live all over Jerusalem,” said Elon.
Kollek does not buy this argument. While Kollek has long maintained that Jerusalem is and must remain the undivided capital of Jerusalem, he consistently blocked any attempts by Jews to settle in solely Arab villages on the grounds that it inflamed tensions in this already volatile city.
He also refuted the yeshiva’s right to build on the adjacent lot for technical reasons.
“Many years ago, before the yeshiva moved in, the area was designated for an Arab girls school,” Kollek told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“The yeshiva knew this before moving in. They were told that they would have only limited space, for that reason. Since moving in, they have tried everything to take possession of the land.
“When I was in government I tried to find an alternative place for the school. After working on the problem for six months, the city engineer came back and said that no such alternative was available.
“There are more than enough places all around Jerusalem to build new yeshivot,” Kollek added.
In response, Elon said, “Kollek did many good things for Jerusalem, but he has an obsession against us. It is discrimination that the only lot on this mountain that is registered to a Jew has been earmarked for other purposes.”
Elon insisted that “the building plan doesn’t even mention the word `Arab.’ The site allows for two types of structures: a school or a building for public services. We fall under the second.”
When all is said and done, it will be Olmert, Jerusalem’s newly appointed mayor, who will ultimately determine the yeshiva’s future.
Elected on a platform stressing “every Jew’s right to live anywhere in the capital,” Olmert must walk a very fine line, alienating neither Jews nor Arabs during his first decisive months in office.
Ruth Yaffi, Olmert’s spokeswoman, described the mayor’s stand this way: “Olmert continues the support of the establishment of the yeshiva in the Beit Orot neighborhood.”
She continued, “The land belongs to private citizens who support the establishment of the yeshiva in this area. He has asked the city engineer to locate an alternative site for the girls school.”
Jamila, a 19-year-old Arab woman from the area, refused to accept Olmert’s position. “This land is for our school. It is the Jews who moved in and occupied it.
“There’s going to be trouble,” she said. “There’s going to be trouble.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
