City Line (Jerusalem)

The City Line ran through a densely built-up city rather than separating two distinct urban settlements: its obstacles cut across neighborhoods, streets and even individual buildings.[1] Known in Hebrew as the “kav ironi,” or urban line, it separated Israeli-held western Jerusalem from Jordanian-held eastern Jerusalem, including the Old City.[1][5] Jerusalem consequently functioned between 1948 and 1967 as a frontier city, with Israeli and Jordanian army outposts facing each other across a physical barrier.[6]

Sources describe the boundary as roughly seven to 7.5 kilometers long.[1][3] It ran from Ramat Rachel in the south to Sanhedria in the north.[7] Its course lay roughly north–south, tangential to the western wall of the Old City.[5] The wider armistice arrangement placed Jerusalem’s western and southern parts under Israeli control and its eastern and northern parts, including the Old City, under Jordanian control.[8] The pre-1967 Israeli-controlled sector covered approximately 38 square kilometers, compared with six square kilometers for Jordanian-controlled East Jerusalem, which included the Old City and adjacent neighborhoods.[9]

The line was not everywhere a single fence or a precisely defined narrow boundary: in some places, two demarcation lines enclosed no-man’s-land between the opposing positions.[8] The Jerusalem and Latrun areas included strips approximately 100–1,200 meters wide where the parties had not agreed on a division of no-man’s-land and where residents of either side required the other side’s consent to enter.[8] Within Jerusalem, the system also included demilitarized areas, controlled crossings and separate enclaves.[10]

After the fighting in the 1948 War of Independence, Israeli forces held Jerusalem’s western sector and Jordanian forces held its eastern parts.[11] A truce took effect throughout the city in November 1948, preceding the general armistice agreement signed by Israel and Jordan on April 3, 1949.[11] The City Line originated in the local cease-fire agreement of November 30, 1948, rather than in a fresh division drawn during the subsequent armistice negotiations.[1][12]

Moshe Dayan, commander of the Jerusalem district, and Abdullah al-Tell, the Jordanian commander on the Jerusalem front, met in an abandoned house in Musrara to mark their respective positions on a map.[1] The map was at a scale of 1:20,000; Dayan used a red pencil for the Israeli positions, while al-Tell used green for the Jordanian positions, the color associated with the name Green Line.[1] The commanders did not expect the rough drawing to become a binding arrangement that would shape life in the city for nineteen years.[1]

The rough markings nevertheless became the accepted cease-fire lines, and the ground between them became no-man’s-land.[1] The Jordan–Israel General Armistice Agreement, signed at Rhodes on April 3, 1949, expressly provided that the Jerusalem-sector Armistice Demarcation Lines would correspond to those defined in the November 30 cease-fire agreement.[12] Thus, the later agreement incorporated the local wartime arrangement instead of replacing it with a newly surveyed Jerusalem boundary.[12]

The agreement defined the demarcation lines as limits beyond which the parties’ armed forces were not to move, and restrictions also applied to civilians crossing the lines or entering the intervening area.[13] Under the November arrangement, movement was permitted within each side’s existing lines, but entry into no-man’s-land required agreement by both sides.[2] Relations across the divided city were also regulated through agreements between local commanders of the Arab Legion and the Israel Defense Forces.[5]

The armistice established a joint Special Committee to work on arrangements for essential connections interrupted by the division.[12] Its remit included traffic on vital roads, specifically the Bethlehem and Latrun–Jerusalem roads; the normal functioning of and access to institutions on Mount Scopus; access to holy places and cultural institutions; and use of the Mount of Olives cemetery.[13] These matters were agreed upon in principle, but the arrangements for Mount Scopus and Jewish holy places were not implemented because Jordan did not cooperate.[5]

The original cease-fire map was drawn on an uneven surface, and its thick grease-pencil strokes created uncertainty about the location of the boundary on the ground.[2] Markings only 3–4 millimeters wide on the map could represent an urban strip 60–80 meters across, encompassing buildings rather than an easily identifiable line between them.[2] Disputes and misunderstandings over the ground represented by the markings contributed to the creation of no-man’s-land areas, most of which were mined and inaccessible to both sides.[1]

The cartographic problem outlasted the physical division: a Jerusalem Traffic Court case in 2001 addressed uncertainty over the course of the no-man’s-land line.[2] The imprecision concerned not merely the width of a drawn boundary, but the practical identification of the area enclosed by the two sides’ positions.[2] The November 1948 drawing remained the reference incorporated into the 1949 agreement despite its origins as a temporary military map.[1][12]

Maps produced during the nineteen years of division presented the city in markedly different ways.[14] Some omitted the urban fabric beyond the boundary, rendering the opposite side as a uniform “deadzone”; others identified armistice lines, demilitarized zones, transit gates and no-man’s-land.[14] Still others depicted both parts of Jerusalem, with the dividing line running through the center of the map.[14]

A 1949 map titled “Central portion of the Jerusalem area: principal Holy Places Israel - Jordan armistice line of 3 April 1949” was published by the Survey of Israel at a scale of 1:10,000, using a Survey of Palestine map as its base.[15] Much later, in December 1964, Israel’s Surveying Department worked on an updated map of Jerusalem and its surroundings that included the City Line.[3] Publication was delayed, and by June 1967 the map no longer reflected conditions in the city; the boundary was erased after the war and a revised map subsequently appeared.[3]

Beit Safafa was divided between Israel and Jordan, leaving members of the same families on opposite sides of the boundary.[3] Relatives nevertheless held joint wedding celebrations with participants on both sides of the line.[3] The Israeli-controlled part was incorporated into Jerusalem and received urban development and schools, while the Jordanian-controlled part remained a village.[3] After the fences were removed in 1967, the street along their former course was renamed Reunification of the Village Street, and municipal investment followed in infrastructure and road repairs.[3]

In Abu Tor, the line separated the western part of the neighborhood, captured by the Jerusalem Brigade in May 1948, from the eastern part under Jordanian control.[16] Its route followed Asahel Street, placing civilians close to a heavily obstructed and fenced military boundary.[16] Most houses on the Jordanian side were fortified, and four were regularly occupied by platoon-sized forces; two permanent Israeli positions were held by squad-sized forces.[16] A street could therefore have one side under Israeli control and the other under Jordanian control throughout the years of division.[16]

The division also severed Jewish access to the Old City and its holy sites, including the Western Wall.[17] The armistice committee’s proposed arrangements included access to Jewish holy places in the Old City and use of the Mount of Olives cemetery, but these provisions did not restore the agreed access during Jordanian rule.[5] At Mount Scopus, the Hebrew University and Hadassah buildings remained isolated, while the institutions moved their principal campuses elsewhere after the war.[3][5]

Walls, barbed wire, concrete observation posts and firing positions marked the line, accompanied by signs warning “Caution, border ahead” and “Beware, snipers.”[4][18] Firing incidents along the fortified urban boundary caused casualties.[1] Much of the no-man’s-land was mined and inaccessible to both sides.[1]

Civilian encounters with the restricted strip could require military and international coordination even when no territorial issue was involved. In one often-recounted episode, a nun near Notre Dame sneezed and lost her false teeth across the line. United Nations personnel and Israeli and Jordanian officers became involved, and the teeth were found and returned.[18]

Another episode occurred in December 1965, after schoolboys’ soccer balls accumulated in no-man’s-land.[19] Israel agreed to return them, and an Israeli officer crossed the minefield while Jordanian soldiers called out directions to help him avoid the mines.[19] Twenty-eight balls were returned to the school two days after Christmas.[19] Such recoveries took place within an environment where ordinary access to the intervening ground remained prohibited without the required cooperation.[2][19]

Mandelbaum Gate was the principal official crossing between Israeli- and Jordanian-controlled Jerusalem.[5] Constructed after the War of Independence, it remained in operation until Israel captured East Jerusalem in June 1967.[17] The crossing took its name from the nearby Mandelbaum family home at the edge of Musrara.[10] Initially, the crossing opened to the United Nations; it later became the official passage for tourists, with passport-control and customs offices.[5]

Access remained tightly regulated rather than constituting normal movement between the city’s two parts. Regular traffic included diplomatic and supply convoys, while Arab-Israeli Christians were permitted to cross at Christmas to visit Christian holy sites under Jordanian control.[17] The gate area also served as the location for meetings of Israeli and Jordanian military officers in the Israel–Jordan Armistice Committee under United Nations auspices.[20]

The building later associated with the Museum on the Seam stood directly on the divide between West and East Jerusalem, beside the Mandelbaum crossing.[20] For several years, a second, unofficial crossing operated in the demilitarized area around the former Government House, then the United Nations headquarters.[5] The American Colony occupied another distinctive boundary location, at the edge of no-man’s-land extending toward Mea Shearim, in the area administered by Jordan until 1967.[21]

Mount Scopus formed an Israeli-controlled enclave north of the city, containing the Hebrew University and Hadassah Hospital and, officially, the village of Issawiyya.[10] Supply convoys traveled to the enclave through Mandelbaum Gate every two weeks under United Nations supervision.[3] The isolated institutional buildings were guarded by Israeli police, whose relief took place through United Nations convoys.[5]

Government House hill formed a separate United Nations-controlled enclave south of the city.[8] The associated demilitarized area included the former British High Commissioner’s residence, the United Nations observers’ headquarters and the Study Farm, and extended west toward Allenby Camp in Talpiot.[7] Together with the Mount Scopus arrangements, this southern zone formed part of the special geography surrounding the main urban divide.[7]

During the June 1967 Six-Day War, Jordanian forces shelled Jewish areas of western Jerusalem, and Israeli forces captured East Jerusalem and the Old City.[5][11] By June 7, Israeli forces controlled the whole city; the walls, barbed wire and checkpoints that had enforced the division were subsequently removed.[4][17] Roads connecting the two parts of Jerusalem were joined.[5]

On June 28, 1967, the Israeli government issued a declaration expanding Jerusalem’s municipal limits.[22] Israeli law, jurisdiction and administration were applied to the areas added to the city.[9] The expanded municipality combined the prewar Israeli-controlled and Jordanian-controlled sectors with approximately 70 additional square kilometers, producing a total area of 108 square kilometers.[9] The added territory incorporated 28 Palestinian villages that had not formed part of Jordanian Jerusalem.[9]

The removal of barriers and demolition of dividing walls proceeded on June 29.[18] Tens of thousands of Jews traveled to the Western Wall, while thousands of Arabs crossed into western Jerusalem.[18] With checkpoints and barriers removed, free movement between East and West Jerusalem was restored, replacing the restricted crossing arrangements of the previous nineteen years.[4]

The physical fence separating Israeli and Jordanian Jerusalem disappeared, but national and ethnic divisions persisted.[6] The city’s earlier confrontation between two states gave way in many respects to an intercommunal confrontation within the expanded city.[6] The former line’s removal thus ended the military barrier without eliminating the social divisions associated with the city’s different communities.[6]

The armistice agreement explicitly stated that the demarcation lines were agreed “without prejudice to future territorial settlements or boundary lines or to claims of either Party relating thereto.”[12] It also preserved both parties’ rights, claims and positions in an eventual peaceful settlement and specified that its terms were dictated by military considerations.[13] The City Line therefore regulated the armistice without establishing an agreed permanent international boundary.[12][13]

Its subsequent political significance has remained disputed: Israel emphasizes that the armistice lines were not formally established borders, while Palestinians and most of the international community regard East Jerusalem as territory occupied in 1967.[23] Israeli courts have treated East Jerusalem as part of Israel under Israeli law, whereas the United Nations has regarded it as occupied territory.[11] The city’s legal and political status and competing claims concerning it remain unresolved.[22]

Later negotiations considered dividing sovereignty in East Jerusalem along demographic lines, with Israeli sovereignty over Jewish neighborhoods and Palestinian sovereignty over Arab neighborhoods.[24] In that framework, the Palestinian side relinquished its original demand that Jerusalem’s boundary follow the Green Line, as part of a territorial swap based in principle on the June 4, 1967 lines.[24] This approach appeared in the Clinton Parameters and subsequent negotiations.[24]

Former no-man’s-land areas also remained relevant: proposals during the Annapolis negotiations and informal talks leading to the Geneva Initiative envisaged dividing those areas equally between the sides.[24] In discussions connected with the Geneva Initiative, Israeli representatives proposed including all of Beit Safafa in Israel, Palestinian representatives objected, and agreement was reached on a proposed border through the village along the 1949 armistice line.[24]