Jerusalem: The Biography

ZIONISM

O Jerusalem: the one man who has been present all this while, the lovable dreamer of Nazareth, has done nothing but increase the hate.

Theodore Herzl, Diary

The angry face of Yahweh is brooding over the hot rocks which have seen more holy murder, rape, and plunder than any other place on this earth.

Arthur Koestler

If a land can have a soul, Jerusalem is the soul of the land of Israel.

David Ben-Gurion, press interview

No two cities have counted more with mankind than Athens and Jerusalem.

Winston Churchill, The Second World War, vol 6: Triumph and Tragedy

It’s not easy to be a Jerusalemite. A thorny path runs alongside its joys. The great are small inside the Old City. Popes, patriarchs, kings all remove their crowns. It is the city of the King of Kings; and earthly kings and lords are not its masters. No human can ever possess Jerusalem.

John Tleel, ‘I am Jerusalem’, Jerusalem Quarterly

And burthened Gentiles

o’er the main

Must bear the weight

of Israel’s hate

Because he is not

brought again

In triumph to Jerusalem.

Rudyard Kipling, ‘The Burden of Jerusalem’