al-Baq‘a

Backgrounder The West Side Story, Part 1: Jerusalem before “East” and “West”

Before 1948, Jerusalem was not split between an “East” and a “West.” Rather, a cosmopolitan, multiethnic New City grew organically out of the Old City.

Personal Story The Baq‘a Zone Ghetto: A Memoir of a Palestinian Jerusalemite Who Remained in West Jerusalem after the War

Jacob Nammar, whose family established the al-Nammamreh neighborhood in al-Baq‘a, shares the trauma his family went through as one of the few Palestinian families who remained.