An architectural history of four prominent buildings in Jerusalem. Includes new research on public and civic architecture of Mandate Palestine. Focuses on four case studies: the Muslim Palestinian Palace Hotel, the Jewish-Zionist Zionist Executive Buildings, the British Palestine Archaeological Museum and the American Jerusalem YMCA Building. Reveals the major role that architecture and architectural culture had in constructing communal and national identities in Jerusalem and in Mandate Palestine. Increases our understanding of the interaction between cultural forces in the Middle East and the emergence of 20th-century architectural culture in Israel/Palestine. Makes a significant contribution to research into the built environments of mixed cities, contested spaces and cities under foreign rule. Deepens our understanding of present spatial dilemmas and their context within the Israeli-Palestinian conflic. Four major communities, four buildings constructing their identities in the contested urban space of Jerusalem.

Mass housing and prefabrication shaped global modernist architecture like no other aspect of industrialised construction. This book offers a comprehensive exploration of how both conventional and experimental prototypes and series gave rise to an architecture for all and responded to crises, nation-building, and housing shortages within the context of transnational and regional research. The book’s contributions explore partially unearthed empirical ground, such as cases from Finland and Sweden, while others offer a fresh interpretation of prefabrication’s role in the history of global architecture, notably in the USSR and Italy. The chapters’ topics encompass colonial expansion, class, international collaboration, and the achievements and setbacks of industrialised design. The authors scrutinise the cultural impact of mass housing and prefabrication, tracing this influence through exhibitions, memory culture, and typologies, ultimately concluding with an outlook on the preservation and repair of structures and their adaptation for the future.

This book is the first to present the unique story of the city of Jerusalem during the events of the Second World War and how it played a unique role in both the military and civilian aspects of the war. Whilst Jerusalem is usually known for topics such as religion, archaeology, or the politics of the Israeli–Arab conflict, this volume provides an in-depth analysis of this exceptional and temporary situation in Jerusalem, offering a perspective that is different from the usual political-strategic-military analysis. Although battles were raging in the nearby countries of Syria and Lebanon, and the war in Egypt and the Western Desert, the people who came to Jerusalem, as well as those who lived there, had different agendas and perspectives. Some were spies and intelligence officers, other were exiles or refugee immigrants from Europe who managed at the last moment to escape Nazi persecution. Journalists and writers described life in the city at this time. All were probably conscious of the fact that when the war came to an end, local rivalry and mounting conflict would take the centre stage again. This was a time of a special, magical drawn-out moment that may shed light on an alternative, more peaceful, kind of Jerusalem that unfortunately was not to be. This volume seeks to find an alternative approach and to contribute to the development of insightful research into life in an unordinary city in an unordinary situation. It will be of value to those interested in military history and the history of the Middle East.

Somewhere between global and local, the nation still lingers as a concept. National art histories continue to be written – some for the first time – while innovative methods and practices redraw the boundaries of these imagined communities. Narratives Unfolding considers the mobility of ideas, transnationalism, and entangled histories in essays that define new ways to see national art in ever-changing nations. Examining works that were designed to reclaim or rethink issues of territory and dispossession, home and exile, contributors to this volume demonstrate that the writing of national art histories is a vital project for intergenerational exchange of knowledge and its visual formations. Essays showcase revealing moments of modern and contemporary art history in Canada, Egypt, Iceland, India, Ireland, Israel/Palestine, Romania, Scotland, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates, paying particular attention to the agency of institutions such as archives, art galleries, milestone exhibitions, and artist retreats. Old and emergent art cities, including Cairo, Dubai, New York, and Vancouver, are also examined in light of avant-gardism, cosmopolitanism, and migration. Narratives Unfolding is both a survey of current art historical approaches and their connection to the source: art-making and art experience happening somewhere.

Empires of Antiquities is a history of the rediscovery of civilizations of the ancient Near East in the imperial order that evolved between the outbreak of the First World War and the 1950s. It explores the ways in which Near Eastern antiquity was redefined and experienced, becoming the subject of new regulation, new modes of knowledge, and international and local politics. A series of globally publicized spectacular archaeological discoveries in Iraq, Egypt, and Palestine, which the book follows, made antiquity visible, palpable and accessible as never before. The new uses of antiquity and its relations to modernity were inseparable from the emergence of the post-war world order, imperial collaboration and collisions, and national aspirations. Empires of Antiquities uniquely combines a history of the internationalization of a new "regime of archaeology" under the oversight of the League of Nations and its web of institutions, a history of British passions for Near Eastern antiquity, on-the-ground colonial mechanisms and nationalist claims on the past. It points to the centrality of the mandate system, particularly mandates classified A, in Mesopotamia/Iraq, Palestine and Transjordan, formerly governed by the Ottoman Empire, and of Egypt, in a new culture of antiquity. Drawing on an unusually wide range of archives in several countries, as well as on visual and material evidence, the book weaves together imperial, international, and local histories of institutions, people, ideas and objects and offers an entirely new interpretation of the history of archaeological discovery and its connections to empires and modernity.

The Object of Zionism is a critical study of Zionist spatial planning and the architectural fabrication of the State of Israel from the early 20th century to the 1960s and '70s. Zvi Efrat scrutinizes Israel as a singular modernist project, unprecedented in its political and ethical circumstances and its hyper-production of spatial and structural experiments. Efrat explores the construction of the State of Israel in a book that promises to become a standard reference on Israeli architectural history.

Recent conflict in the Middle East has caused some observers to ask if Muslims and Christians can ever coexist. History suggests that relations between those two groups are not predetermined, but are the product of particular social and political circumstances. This book examines Muslim-Christian relations during an earlier period of political and social upheaval, and explores the process of establishing new forms of national and religious identification. Palestine's Arab Christian minority actively engaged with the Palestinian nationalist movement throughout the period of British rule (1917-1948). Relations between Muslim and Christian Arabs were sometimes strained, yet in Palestine, as in other parts of the world, communalism became a specific response to political circumstances. While Arab Christians first adopted an Arab nationalist identity, a series of outside pressures - including British policies, the rise of a religious conflict between Jews and Muslims, and an increase in Islamic identification among some Arabs - led Christians to adhere to more politicized religious groupings by the 1940s. Yet despite that shift Christians remained fully nationalist, insisting that they could be both Arab and Christian.

"An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind." - Mahatma Gandhi The story of suffering on both sides needs to be told. The aftermath of the devastating attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023, plunged the region into a relentless cycle of violence and chaos. The initial assault claimed the lives of approximately 1139 Israelis and foreign nationals, with 764 civilians among the casualties, along with 248 individuals taken hostage in the Gaza Strip. Subsequent clashes led to thousands of Palestinian deaths, predominantly women and children, in Gaza, with no distinction made between combatants and civilians. The conflict spilled into the West Bank, with Palestinians suffering from military actions and settler violence. Casualties were reported across Israel, Southern Lebanon, and Syria, demonstrating the widespread impact. As days passed, the conflict showed no signs of resolution, highlighting the complex and far-reaching consequences, leaving an indelible mark on the region.

The Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture is the most comprehensive reference work in this complex and diverse area of art history. Built on the acclaimed scholarship of the Grove Dictionary of Art, this work offers over 1,600 up-to-date entries on Islamic art and architecture ranging from the Middle East to Central and South Asia, Africa, and Europe and spans over a thousand years of history. Recent changes in Islamic art in areas such as Afghanistan, Iran, and Iraq are elucidated here by distinguished scholars. Entries provide in-depth art historical and cultural information about dynasties, art forms, artists, architecture, rulers, monuments, archaeological sites and stylistic developments. In addition, over 500 illustrations of sculpture, mosaic, painting, ceramics, architecture, metalwork and calligraphy illuminate the rich artistic tradition of the Islamic world. With the fundamental understanding that Islamic art is not limited to a particular region, or to a defined period of time, The Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture offers pathways into Islamic culture through its art.