It passes the beginning of Jaffa Road near the Jerusalem Central Bus Station and the headquarters of Magen David Adom.

[2] Named after the famous Harel Brigade,[2] this 0.3 km section widens into a 6-lane divided boulevard between the Sanhedria and Shmuel HaNavi neighborhoods.

This 0.6 km stretch passes Kiryat Menachem Begin, the Dan Jerusalem Hotel (formerly the Hyatt Regency) and the main entrance road to the Hebrew University's Har HaTsofim campus.

While most traffic continues straight through the new Har HaTzofim tunnels bypassing East Jerusalem's built-up areas and connecting to Highway 1 to Ma'ale Adumim and the Dead Sea, the official Route 417 makes a right turn southward onto Wadi al-Joz St.

Continuing southward as a commercial street, this 0.4 km stretch, named after the famous 10th-century Arab geographer,[2] passes the Failey Center for the Arts and the Rockefeller Museum as it approaches the northeast corner of Jerusalem's Old City.

The road then runs along the bottom of the Mount of Olives and continues through the Ras al-Amud, Ma'ale ha-Zeitim and Wadi Qadum neighborhoods as a commercial street.