This page is subject to the extended confirmed restriction related to the Arab-Israeli conflict.Katamon or Qatamon (Hebrew: קטמון; Arabic: قطمون, romanized: Qaṭamūn; Greek: Καταμόνας, romanized: Katamónas; from the Ancient Greek κατὰ τῷ μοναστηρίῳ, katà tôi monastēríōi, 'by the monastery'),[2] officially known as Gonen (Hebrew: גּוֹנֵן, lit.

During the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine, the local population fled the intense fighting in the area and were not allowed to return by the new Israeli state.

After Israel's independence the streets were named based on subjects such as the 1948 war, biblical and rabbinic characters, and Zionist figures.

From the late fourteenth century, the location of Katamon seem to have been identified with the home of Simeon from the Gospel of Luke,[7] the Jerusalemite who first recognised the infant Jesus as "the Lord's Christ", i.e. the promised Messiah (Luke 2:25–32).In 1524, after the Ottoman Turks conquered the region from the Mamluks, it was reported that a church of St. Simeon, previously held by the Georgians, was now empty in the wake of Muslim attacks.

[8] In 1890 the Greek–Orthodox patriarch Nicodemus I of Jerusalem built his summer house near the monastery (since the 1960s the building serves as a disabled care center).

The Church sold, shortly before the war, some of its estate outside of the Old City, which were deemed as "less holy" including Katamon, which was split into plots for housing in a rural area.

And when the raffle take place, you may win adjacent plots...German aerial photographs taken during the war show building lots demarcated by stones at Katamon in a grid plan way, and a system of dirt roads.

[17][18] Most of the builders were Arab–Christians from the Greek–Orthodox community, headed by Issa Michael al-Toubbeh, but among them were some Latin rite Catholics (some from an Italian origin)[16][14] and Armenian Protestants.

[19] The apartments were rented to Arab people and British officials, army officers and their families, who preferred to live in a Christian neighborhood.

The Latin rite Catholic community made their prayer at the Chapel of St. Theresa in Katamon or in churches located in the Old City.

[23][20] By March only a few families remained in the neighborhood, guarded by irregular forces based on San Simon Monastery.

[21] During the war, attacks by the Arab side originated from the Greek Orthodox Saint Simeon Monastery in Katamon that was located in a strategic point overlooking the Jewish neighborhoods.

In the battle over Katamon, which was centered around the St. Simeon monastery, most of the Arab fighters in the city participated, after they were called upon by the local militia.

His men were equipped with light weapons and homemade armoured vehicles as well as ones looted from the battle of Nabi Daniel.

Against them were the Jewish fighters of the fourth battalion of the Harel Brigade, who were exhausted from the constant fighting in earlier battles.

When the Arabs saw no reinforcement will arrive they decided to halt their attack and withdrew, letting to Jews take the neighborhood.

[24] Historian Saleh Abdel Jawad wrote that "indiscriminate killings" occurred on 29 April after the neighborhood was captured by the Haganah.

[28]Approximately 30,000 books, newspapers and manuscripts were collected by the National Library of Israel from Katamon and the other Arab neighborhoods.

[31] During May–June, some 1,400 Jews, consisting of women, children, elders and wounded[32] were expelled from the Jewish Quarter of the Old City by the Jordanian Arab Legion after it fell on 28 May.

In the early 1950s, many public housing projects were built in Katamon, often using the Wild Bau cladding style - a random rubble masonry pattern - which was adopted by modernist architects in Jerusalem.

Katamon attracted many people because of the character of its small "Arab styled" houses, with yards, stone walls and gates, porches, tiled roofs and stylized floors, located close to the city's center.

The conservative and semi-rural character attracted, mainly after the 1980s, families of Jewish immigrants, mostly wealthy religious ones from western countries, who were able to purchase and renovate the houses.

Around the square are five historical buildings that were used for the embassies and foreign consulates of Lebanon (during the British era only), Poland, Venezuela, El Salvador, Belgium and Greece.

[42] The old Hapoel stadium was purchased by developers and is now the site of the upscale Ganei Katamon neighborhood, ringing Ofira Navon park.

The Misgav Ladach hospital on the southern edge of the neighbourhood specialized in maternity care, but is now a medical center for Kupat Holim Meuhedet.

"Defenders"), built in the early years of the state to accommodate the large wave of new immigrants from Iraq and Kurdistan, previously living in tent camps.