Jewish Settlement in the City of David

It was thanks to God who turned toward us the compassion of the Ishmaelite kingdom, that it stretched out its hand…and came to Jerusalem. With the Ishmaelites were Jews, who showed them the site of the Temple and have remained with them [in Jerusalem] from that time to this very day.

letter from the Jerusalem Yeshiva to the Diaspora, mid-eleventh century

After Caliph Omar conquered Jerusalem, he ordered that 70 Jewish families be brought from Tiberias to the city, which was inhabited only by Christians at the time. He did so because he believed the Jews would be sympathetic to Muslim rule.

The Jews asked to settle near the Temple Mount gates and the Pool of Siloam, apparently in the area of the City of David of today. According to legend, Omar wanted to find the place where David had prayed (that is, the ruined Temple) on the Temple Mount. He cleared away the garbage that had been thrown out there by the Christians and built a mosque, which no longer exists, on the southern side of the Mount.