The King's Garden

"Rabbi Yosi said: 'Let your fellow’s property be as dear to you as your own.'"

(Mishnah Avot 2:17)

 

Perspectives from Settlers

The US fundraising arm of the Ateret Cohanim settler organization stated on their website:

Ateret Cohanim has been very active recently in helping to restore the area called Gan Hamelech (the King’s Garden).  A national Jewish treasure – it is rich in Jewish history (Avraham meets Malkitzedek in valley, King David is there, King Solomon writes his “Song of Songs” in Kings Garden and plants every conceivable fruit tree in this fertile area). Full of layers of archeology, the area has been zoned as a green nature reserve and archeological park for many years.

The 'unrestricted' illegal building by others in Gan Hamelech of at least 88 homes has destroyed the Garden and many of the rich historical artifacts that linked the historical Jewish presence to Jerusalem.

Devorah and Yonatan Adler, along with their six children, are Jewish settlers living in Silwan in a house purchased for them by the Elad settler organization. In a 2010 interview Yonatan Adler commented:

The City of David is where Jerusalem began. This is where prophets walked. This is where half of the Bible was written. This is what we're talking about.

In another interview, his wife Devorah said:

To think of it purely as an Arab neighborhood, in my summation, is just a shame. When you look back at the history here, that this was the biblical City of David, where King David ruled, where almost all of the books of the Bible were written, the streets that prophets walked through, kings walked through, priests on their way up to the Temple – which is just up the hill from here - it seems like a shame to call it an Arab village. 

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