Jerusalem, as the geopolitical nexus between Palestine and Israel, is the crux of their territorial negotiations. An area of contention for over five thousand years, the city is currently claimed by both states as their capital. In an effort to avoid this conflict, UNESCO inscribed the Old City of Jerusalem within its own category on the World Heritage List in 1981, whereas every other site is listed under its corresponding country. Protection of the Old City under the organization is limited to the boundary delineated by its newest fortification, built by the Ottomans in the 16th century during their occupation of Jerusalem. Several sites outside these walls, that had once been within the boundaries of the city, were excluded at the time of its inscription. This allowed for contested areas to fall under the jurisdiction of Israeli settler organizations based out of East Jerusalem.

The City of David Foundation and the East Jerusalem Development Company operate under the guise of preserving these sites, though they are in fact settlement enterprises. By presenting only a Jewish narrative in their archaeological parks and exhibitions, these enterprises expose visitors to a singular version of a multi-faceted history, favoring a Zionist agenda. The narrative presented to visitors at these sites is instrumental in displacing and erasing the Palestinian people who inhabit Jerusalem and the surrounding neighborhoods.

This Thesis proposes the insertion of a series of episodic interventions into Kidron Valley, which lies along the eastern wall of the Old City, in order to counter the control these Zionist enterprises have over heritage in the area. The valley is flanked by two sites excluded from the Old City of Jerusalem’s inscription within UNESCO’s World Heritage List. Siloam Tunnel, the ancient water supply under the “City of David”, and the Mount of Olives, a necropolis, are linked and transformed through the placement of borrowed and manipulated architectural fragments from the valley that lies between them. A series of moments inserted between the tunnel and the necropolis guide the visitor, preserving and revealing the historical narrative buried by biased preservation.

Siloam Tunnel and the Mount of Olives had until the 1980s been considered part of the Old City of Jerusalem. The distinction between what lies within the wall and what lies on its periphery results in the misconception that these sites do not belong to the city and its urban fabric. The study of civic and religious narratives responding to Islam, Judaism, and Christianity begins to uncover the myths rooted in Kidron Valley. Architectural remnants found in the valley reveal that these myths are grounded in a spatial reality.

Selections from the Quran, the Bible, and the Torah allude to Kidron Valley as a hellscape. Five bridges and trajectories across the valley are mentioned within these narratives, though they no longer exist and may never have existed beyond their corresponding myths. Traces of an infrastructure absent from the fabric of the city begin to emerge, linking the Old City of Jerusalem to Siloam Tunnel and the Mount of Olives.