Shmuel HaNavi (Hebrew: שיכון שמואל הנביא, Shikun Shmuel HaNavi, lit. "Shmuel HaNavi neighborhood") is a neighborhood in north-central Jerusalem. It is bordered by the Sanhedria cemetery to the north, Maalot Dafna to the east, Arzei HaBira to the south, and Bukharim to the west. It is named after Shmuel HaNavi Street, which runs along its western border and is the main road leading to the tomb of Samuel the prophet (Hebrew: Shmuel HaNavi) just outside Jerusalem’s city limits.[1]
In 1941, the Biblical Zoo, initially a small children's zoo on Harav Kook Street in central Jerusalem, was moved to a 4.5 dunam tract on Shmuel HaNavi Street before relocating to the campus of the Hebrew University on Mount Scopus in 1947.[2]
In the 1950s the new state of Israel struggled to absorb large numbers of immigrants, moving them out of temporary tents and huts into permanent apartments. Shmuel HaNavi was one of the neighborhoods built to accommodate these immigrants.[3] Constructed in the early 1960s,[4] it was situated next to the 1949 armistice line that ran parallel to Shmuel HaNavi Street, in order to reinforce the city's hold on its northern border.[5] A no man's land of barbed wire and minefields separated the neighborhood from the fortifications of Ammunition Hill to the north.[6]
Considering the location, the complex of 22[7] "long train" tenement buildings were built in the manner of fortresses.[8] The Israel Housing Ministry mandated that the external concrete walls of the buildings be three times the normal thickness to withstand shelling.[9] The roofs of the buildings had raised parapets fitted with gun slots.[8] The buildings themselves were arranged in a "confusing zig-zag pattern" to slow down Arab armies that might charge the complex,[10] and the courtyards between the buildings were designed to accommodate mass mobilization of Israeli troops in the event of an attack.[8] For many years, residents barricaded their building entrances with sandbags and reinforced or blocked windows exposed to the border with Jordan.[11]
The project was largely populated by Sephardi Jewish immigrants from North Africa.[12] The buildings – each "four stories in height, 32 apartments to a building, containing small flats of 70 meters housing large families"[13] – suffered from overcrowding[1] and lack of infrastructure, and quickly turned into a slum.[14][15]
By the late 1970s, when the population had reached 4,000, a significant number of youth had dropped out of school and organized themselves into gangs. In response, Ohalim, an urban protest movement that promoted "positive activity" among disadvantaged immigrant populations in Jerusalem, established a community council in Shmuel HaNavi, along with similar councils in Nachlaot, Baka, and Kiryat Yovel, between 1977 and 1981.[12] The Shmuel HaNavi branch called itself Ohel Shmuel. It "organized neighborhood clean-up campaigns, helped rid one of the buildings of prostitutes, organized cultural activities and holiday celebrations, initiated activities for the elderly, helped involve marginal youth in productive activity by setting up a lighting fixture factory for them, and organized learning centers for children and youth".[16]
In 1968, a year after the Six-Day War and the reunification of Jerusalem, a community center opened in the neighborhood.[17] Shmuel HaNavi underwent a significant upgrade under Project Renewal, a national urban renewal program that upgraded housing, infrastructure and utilities in 84 Israeli neighborhoods between 1977 and 1984.[18] A new facade was added to each building in the complex, and apartments were enlarged and even combined to create larger living quarters.[1] The Jewish Agency for Israel, a Project Renewal co-partner, paired cities in the United States with Israeli neighborhoods slated for rehabilitation;[19] Washington, D.C. was twinned with Shmuel HaNavi.[20]
As the first generation of immigrant children matured and left the neighborhood, their parents followed, and Haredi families from Mea Shearim, Bukharim and Geula took their place. Today the Shmuel HaNavi neighborhood is largely Haredi.[1]
Sanhedrin Park, north of the Shmuel HaNavi-Bar Ilan intersection, contains burial caves from the Second Temple period.[21]
