National Headquarters of the Israel Police

An official Israel Police service page gives the National Headquarters' address as 1 Haim Bar-Lev Street, Sheikh Jarrah, Jerusalem, while the force's 2023 statistical yearbook places it on Haim Bar-Lev Road in Jerusalem.[1][5] The headquarters occupies the Menachem Begin Government Complex, a roughly 120-dunam site north of Sheikh Jarrah, between the western part of Mount Scopus and Ammunition Hill. The complex also contains the Ministry of Construction and Housing and other government offices.[2]

Within the Israel Police's unified command hierarchy, the National Headquarters is headed by the Inspector General.[3][4] All police units, including the Border Guard, are subordinate to it.[4] Headquarters bodies cover operational work—including operations, investigations and intelligence, and traffic—and force-building or administrative functions such as training, human resources, logistics, technology and communications, planning, legal advice, finance, and prosecution.[5][4] The complex is adjacent to two light-rail lines.[7]

During the British Mandate, the Russian Compound in central Jerusalem served as a major administrative center. Built between 1860 and 1864 for Russian pilgrims on a site of 18.5 acres, its buildings were used for government offices, police headquarters, the central prison, law courts, and a government hospital.[8][9] A National Library of Israel photograph catalogued to 1949 identifies the compound as the headquarters of the Israel Police Jerusalem District, a designation distinct from the national headquarters.[10] On the night of May 14–15, 1948, Jewish forces took control of central government buildings in the compound, including the police headquarters, as the British Mandate ended.[8]

The original national headquarters of the newly established Israel Police occupied a British Mandate-era building on HaRakevet Street in Tel Aviv, where the first Israel Police commissioner had his offices.[11] A February 2, 1968, Maariv headline announced that the national headquarters would be situated in Jerusalem's Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, documenting the planned move rather than its completion.[12] The transfer began in 1969, when the Commissioner and his office, together with much of the Organization and Investigations divisions, relocated to a first building in Sheikh Jarrah.[6] While a second building was being completed, more than 30 police personnel and their families had already settled in Jerusalem. The completed transfer was expected to bring 600 personnel and families to the city, although housing costs and other material conditions made the transition difficult.[6]

The headquarters moved from Tel Aviv into a previously unfinished Jordanian government building in Sheikh Jarrah as part of a wider transfer of Israeli government and public institutions to Jerusalem, particularly its eastern section.[8] After the Six-Day War, authorities expropriated a hospital building and surrounding land near Sheikh Jarrah for the government complex. Some national-headquarters departments were transferred there from Jaffa, and a seven-story building was later constructed beside the existing structure for the remaining departments.[2]

After 1967, Israeli government institutions—including the Israel Police national headquarters and a government compound—were built alongside Sheikh Jarrah.[13] The wider Sheikh Jarrah–Shimon HaTzadik corridor also had an established Jewish presence before 1948, including Nahlat Shimon, founded in 1891, and the area around the tomb of Shimon HaTzadik; residents were evacuated as security deteriorated near the end of the Mandate.[14] Nadav Shragai interprets post-1967 Israeli construction and the restoration of institutions around Mount Scopus as efforts to maintain its connection with western Jerusalem and prevent it from becoming isolated again.[14]

After the national headquarters left Tel Aviv, the former HaRakevet Street building became the home of the Yarkon District police.[11]

The headquarters' location has figured in several notable episodes. In 1981, Prime Minister Menachem Begin announced his intention to move the Prime Minister's Office to the National Police Headquarters building in Sheikh Jarrah. U.S. ambassador Samuel Lewis told Begin that if the move took place, the two would no longer be able to meet—a diplomatic signal concerning the status of East Jerusalem. Begin's plan was never implemented.[15]

On October 9, 2016, a terrorist drove toward the National Headquarters and opened fire at vehicles waiting at a nearby junction, causing a traffic accident.[16] In a separate incident on October 8, 2015, a 25-year-old yeshiva student was critically injured in a stabbing at a Jerusalem light-rail station near the headquarters.[17] Both attacks occurred on or near approaches to the complex.

A significant redevelopment of the Menachem Begin Government Complex has been under consideration. A Jerusalem Institute for Policy Research event in November 2021 noted that plans for increased construction permits in Kiryat Begin included the Israel Police National Headquarters, without specifying the type or status of the proposed work.[18] In May 2025, a proposal advanced to an initial discussion by the Jerusalem District Planning and Building Committee. It called for demolishing existing government-office buildings and constructing a mixed-use development totaling approximately 575,000 square meters, including 1,500 housing units. The first planned building was a new police national-headquarters tower of approximately 56,000 square meters and 40 floors. The project was to be built in stages and financed through marketing land occupied by the existing buildings.[2]

On December 17, 2025, the Jerusalem District Planning and Building Committee approved for deposit a plan covering approximately 300,000 square meters on roughly 120 dunams of state land along Bar-Lev Road. It included about 1,500 housing units, buildings of up to 35 floors, approximately 100,000 square meters for commerce and employment, and a 15-dunam park. The existing National Headquarters and older government buildings were to be vacated for the project. The Police Traffic Division and units of the Operations Division then located in central Israel were planned to move to Jerusalem, while the national headquarters was to be significantly expanded.[7] The December report gave different overall-area and height figures from the May proposal, indicating that the published figures concern different planning stages or versions rather than a single unchanged specification.[2][7]

Architect Shari Kronish of Bimkom–Planners for Planning Rights criticized the proposal's housing provisions, arguing that the planned units were not accessible or adapted to Palestinian residents' needs and would not address their housing shortage. She favored lower-rise construction suited to neighborhood conditions and said the plan could otherwise have contributed toward a stated target of 2,000 housing units per year for Palestinians in East Jerusalem.[2]