A Glimpse of the Rehavia neighborhood in 1945,
Another Once Upon A Time In Jerusalem
Sheep grazing in “Emek Hamatzleva” back when the valley extended to the outskirts of the Rehavia neighborhood. The house on the left is the Rosenbaum House on today’s Saadia Gaon Street, near Metudela Street. In the middle is the Arched House on Ben Labrat Street, and on the right is the Tnuva Worker’s House, the “financially secured” of those days, at the intersection of Ben Labrat and Ben Saruk streets.
Those were the days…
Later, the Evelina de Rothschild School for Religious Girls was built on this site.
The school was founded in the Jewish Quarter as early as the mid-19th century and was the first school where lessons were taught in Hebrew in addition to English.
The school moved outside the Old City walls in 1888 to
Beit Machnaim on HaNevi’im Street, then to Helene HaMalka, and from there to Ussishkin Street, near the Hebrew Gymnasium.
In the 1970s, the school moved to its current location on Ben Labrat Street.
The ancient olive grove was thinned, leaving only a few trees.
“Emek Hamatzleva” is now halved and now has a four-lane boulevard. The grazing sheep have been replaced by curly-haired students conversing in proper Hebrew, and the bare hills have donned a dress of concrete and cement, dotted with new and crowded buildings.
This is our Jerusalem.
A peaceful Shabbat to far and near, good news to those living in Zion, and may peace finally come to Israel.
Photo by Nahum Gidal.
