In 1516 the land was conquered by the Ottoman Turkish Empire. During the sixteenth century the Ottomans imposed restrictions on the Jews in Jerusalem, which made possible the golden age in Safed. During the time of Suleiman the Lawgiver the Ottomans fortified Jerusalem and Safed, built caravansaries, fortresses and more.

However, at the end of the sixteenth century the first signs of the decline of the Ottoman Empire and the entire country were already visible, a decline that persisted until the nineteenth century. During this time, thanks to the involvement of the great powers of the day and increasing modernization (steamships, the telegraph and trains), the Land of Israel went from the neglected backwater of the empire to a lodestone for pilgrims, scholars and tourists.

Scientific study of this country began in the nineteenth century, at the end of which the first neighborhoods were built outside the walls of Jerusalem and the Zionist waves of immigrations began. The status of Jerusalem grew stronger and its population increased. In 1839 Jews were a majority in the city and in 1870, the Jewish community was bigger than all the other communities together (11,000 out of a total population of 22,000). At the beginning of the twentieth century, a great deal of land was purchased in the City of David by the Baron Rothschild, and ownership of these lands was later transferred to the State of Israel.