[6] Originally, it was simply a point from which pilgrims could rest, look across the Jordan Valley, catch a glimpse of Mount Nebo where (as suggested by the Hebrew Bible) the tomb of Moses used to be, and worship it from this spot.

[15] In any case, tradition holds that the spot where the shrine now stands was shown to Saladin in a dream, which prompted him to build a mosque at the site, later expanded by Baibars.

[13] The Arab geographer Mujir al-Din from Jerusalem, writing in the 1490s, admits that the tradition has only a weak chance of authenticity, but that Nabi Musa still is the most popular among several sites with similar claims.

[17] It is claimed that Saladin, after defeating the Europeans, wanted to ensure that future Crusades wouldn't take advantage of the large annual Easter pilgrimage to Jerusalem in order to again wrestle the Holy City from the Muslims.

[18][19] In 1269, the Mamluk sultan Baibars al-Bunduqdari built a small shrine there, as part of a general policy he adopted after conquering towns and rural areas from Lebanon down to Hebron from the Crusaders.

[20] Baibars' construction inscription is still to be seen, and it indicates the year the shrine was built, AH 668 (1269-70 CE), and the fact that he "ordered the building of this noble sacred place over the tomb of Moses" while he was on his way from Mecca, where he had performed his hajj, towards Jerusalem.

Its permanent staff provided pilgrims with food and supplies, as well as religious services and information about the safety conditions of the route to Jerusalem, which was often subject to raids or robberies by the Bedouin present in the area.

In the mid-16th century, Muhammad Celebi al-Naqqash, the Ottoman official charged with restoring the walls of Jerusalem, was assigned with rehabilitating the Nabi Musa complex.

[6] This 'invention of tradition', as such imaginative constructs are called,[23] made the pageantry of the Nabi Musa pilgrimage a potent symbol of both political and religious identity among Muslims from the outset of the modern period.

[24][6][clarification needed] Over the 19th century, thousands of Muslims would assemble in Jerusalem, trek to Nabi Musa, and pass three days in feasting, prayer, games and visits to the nearby tomb of Moses' shepherd, Hasan er-Rai.

[6] James Finn, the British Consul in Jerusalem (1846–1863), described the "Neby Moosa pilgrimage" as follows: The Neby Moosa pilgrimages—to the reputed tomb of the prophet Moses, near the Dead Sea (on the West)—have been instituted so as to coincide with the Christian pilgrimages to the Holy Sepulchre, and the influx of devout Moslems was doubtless intended to counterbalance the effect of so many thousands of sturdy Christians being present in Jerusalem.

[25]As part of the mid-19th-century Ottoman modernisation and reform period, the newly created local council for Jerusalem was put in charge of organising the Nabi Musa festivities.

[26] The festival had taken its traditional shape since the start of the Ottoman era in the 16th century, but now it was restructured, with the main events focusing on the Haram ash-Sharif, with the district mufti of Jerusalem already playing a distinct role which would only increase later on.

Indeed, the Turkish government must have acted here against popular feelings, shared by the Husaynis as the masters of the ceremony that Nabi Musa was celebrated in the most unfavourable conditions for the Muslims.

'[27][28]The procession moved off from Jerusalem under a distinctive Nabi Musa banner which the Husaynis conserved for the annual occasion in their al-Dar al-Kabira (the Great House).

[29] On arriving at the shrine, the al-Husaynis and another rising Jerusalem family of notables (A'ayan), the Yunis clan, were required to provide two meals a day over the week for all worshippers.

[31] Writing in the early 20th century, Samuel Curtiss recorded that an estimated 15,000[32] people from all over the country attended the Nabi Musa festival every year.

[18] The young Hajj Amin al-Husseini, who had held an anti-Zionist speech to the masses before the riots broke out, was pointed out by the British authorities as the principal instigator, which only helped him gain in popularity among the Arabs.

[18] In 1921, while in the process of becoming Grand Mufti, Amin al-Husseini started redesigning the festival according to his view of the national interest of the Palestinian Arabs.

[26] By detaching Palestine from the Ottoman Empire and uniting several former distinct provinces under this new name, for which they organised both a civilian representation for its Arab inhabitants, and a religious one for the Muslim majority, the British had created the base and institutions for the development of a burgeoning national identity.

[18] With the Mufti abroad and the revolt suppressed by the British Army, the festival shrunk in scale and lost the political dimension it had gained in the previous decades.

The Jordanian authorities were aware of the potential of the Nabi Musa festival of stirring Palestinian nationalist feelings and riots, and immediately after the 1951 assassination of King Abdullah I by a Palestinian Arab connected to the powerful al-Husayni family, which were also the custodians of Nabi Musa, they suspended the mass gathering in Jerusalem and the procession, allowing only for the celebrations at the desert sanctuary to be held.

The Bedouin not only shared in the belief surrounding the sanctity of the site, but further believed that God had blessed this place where Moses was buried with 'fire rocks' and water wells.

Tawfiq Canaan, in his work Mohammedan Saints and Sanctuaries (1927), noted that the black rocks around the shrine would burn when placed in fire and were also used as amulets after being cut into square and triangular forms and inscribed with protective texts.

The colours were wonderful, bright pink, purple or blue velvet coats, yellow dresses with embroideries in red and green et cetera, and all wore a white veil.