ABSTRACT
According to archaeological remains, the history of the place now called
Jerusalem, one of the ancient cities of Canaan, goes back some five thou-
sand years (Franken 1989, 11-41). Located in a land at a crossroads, in the
center of Afro-Eurasia, Jerusalem fell to the rule of most of the ancient
empires that emerged in the region. Like the rest of the Syrian region, it was
ruled at times by ancient Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Macedonia, Rome,
Byzantium, and the various Muslim caliphates. In more recent history, it
was at the center of several conflicts between European Christendom and the Islamic world (in the Middle Ages), of European colonial aspirations (in
the nineteenth century), and of Arab-Israeli and Palestinian-Israeli con-
flicts (in the twentieth century).
