
The Old City of Beit Jala
The city of Beit Jala, which translates from Aramaic as “home of the grass carpet,”
King David’s Wells are three water cisterns located within the grounds of the Catholic Action Center, just a few minutes’ walk from the Church of the Nativity. The wells, which are still in use, are related to the place where David's soldiers broke through the Philistine lines in order to fetch him drinking water. When they returned to the Cave of Adullam, where the king and his followers were hiding, the king declined to drink from the water which his soldiers risked their lives to retrieve. In 1895, remains of a mosaic from a Byzantine church and an underground monks’ cemetery were discovered just beyond the cisterns. Opening hours: 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Location: Star Street, King David’s Roundabout, Bethlehem.
The city of Beit Jala, which translates from Aramaic as “home of the grass carpet,”
The Souq, or the traditional marketplace, is located in the city’s Old Core.
Bethlehem’s historic center stretches in a North-South axis on top of a ridge that overlooks the ...