Jerusalem’s formal political borders reveal neither the dynamics of power in the city nor the underlying factors that make an agreement between Israel and the Palestinians so difficult. The lines delineating Israeli authority are frequently different from those delineating segregated housing or areas of uneven service provision or parallel national electoral districts of competing educational jurisdictions. In particular, the city’s large number of holy sites and restricted religious compounds create enclaves that continually threaten to undermine the Israeli state’s authority and control over the city. This lack of congruity between political control and the actual spatial organization and everyday use of the city leaves many areas of occupied East Jerusalem in a kind of twilight zone where citizenship, property rights, and the enforcement of the rule of law are ambiguously applied. Michael Dumper plots a history of Jerusalem that examines this intersecting and multileveled matrix and in so doing is able to portray the constraints on Israeli control over the city and the resilience of Palestinian enclaves after forty-five years of Israeli occupation. Adding to this complex mix is the role of numerous external influences—religious, political, financial, and cultural—so that the city is also a crucible for broader contestation. While the Palestinians may not return to their previous preeminence in the city, neither will Israel be able to assert a total and irreversible dominance. His conclusion is that the city will not only have to be shared, but that the sharing will be based upon these many borders and the interplay between history, geography, and religion.

The brilliant and controversial architect discusses his work in Jerusalem where he has rebuilt part of the Jewish quarter and designed, among other projects, two rabbinical colleges and a memorial to the children of the Holocaust. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Covering a range of critical subjects, the essays in Jerusalem: A City and Its Future address practical issues of concern and offer possible solutions for peace in Jerusalem. The perspectives are unique and many have never been published for a wider audience. Contributors consider aspects of the "politics of religion"—an issue rarely explored objectively in existing literature—as well as issues of law and politics, law and religion, the Temple Mount, and law and governance.