Israel Matzav: Mount of Olives cemetery goes online

Mount of Olives cemetery goes online

What is probably the world's oldest and larges Jewish cemetery is now online.

Tens of thousands of graves on the mount have already been mapped and incorporated into a database, in the first-ever attempt to restore the graves and record the history of those who were buried there. The project includes the creation of a Web site (www.mountofolives.co.il) that aims to raise awareness of the City of David and to honor the memory of those buried in the cemetery, as well as to inform about the tours and activities available.

Additionally, the Web site tells stories of the people buried in the cemetery and, through a simple search window, one can locate the documented graves by name.

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While more than 20,000 gravestones have already been documented, organizers estimate that there are between 200,000 and 300,000 in the cemetery, which leaves an enormous amount of work left to be done.

The already documented graves include those of the reviver of the Hebrew language, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, Nobel Prize for Literature laureate Shai Agnon, former prime minister Menachem Begin, Hadassah Women's Organization founder Henrietta Szold, founder of the Bezalel Art School Boris Schatz, Chaim ben Moses ibn Attar, also known as the Ohr ha-Chaim after his popular commentary on the Torah, and Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak Kook, the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of the British Mandate.

Burial on the Mount of Olives dates back around 3,000 years, to the First and Second Temple periods, and continues to this day. Under Jordanian rule, from 1948-1967, the cemetery was badly vandalized. Tombstones were destroyed, broken and uprooted and many were used to pave the floors of Jordanian army encampments.

During this time, a road was paved from the top of the mountain southward, and the road to Jericho was widened, all on top of graves.

After the Six Day War, the cemetery was slowly restored. Yet until now, there has been no major effort to map and record the graves and to decipher and restore the names on all the tombstones.

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The Web site also lets visitors create a tourist map and route of the graves that they wish to visit that can be printed complete with driving and parking instructions.

For anyone who has spent time there wandering around looking hopelessly for a specific grave, this is awesome.

Israel Matzav: Mount of Olives cemetery goes online