Palestinians take pride in renovating historic buildings

Letter from Jerusalem:Khaled and I walk through Herod's Gate, turn sharply right and climb the shallow steps which lie beside the stone block wall of the Old City. Underfoot are pink, beige and white paving stones polished smooth over the centuries by the feet of thousands of Jerusalemites, visitors and pilgrims navigating the narrow alleyways and crooked streets of the thrice holy city. At its highest point stands the Spafford Children's Centre.

Khaled opens the door and leads the way, crunching over rubble to reach a courtyard where two workmen crouch in the shade drinking small cups of coffee. The centre is under restoration by craftsmen using materials and techniques employed between 1850 and 1900, when the Ottomans ruled the region and fine houses like this were built.

The most elegant space is a vast diwan, a perfectly proportioned reception room with domed ceiling and red, black and white marble floor. We climb a narrow flight of steps to a landing to gaze at the cupolas, domes, spires and minarets of the Old City. Laundry flapping on flat rooftops reassures us that Jerusalem is a living city, not a museum. In 1881 this Ottoman mansion became the home of 16 Protestant pilgrims from Chicago led by Horatio Spafford. Their mission was to live a simple communal life, educate and provide medical care for the local people and feed the poor. The Spaffordites, dubbed the "American colony", were soon joined by two sizeable groups of Swedish Americans and moved to a large villa outside the Old City. At the turn of the century the villa provided accommodation for travellers and it eventually became the renowned American Colony Hotel.

The Spaffordites kept the building in the Old City for their charitable work. During the first World War it became a Red Cross facility, in 1925 an orphanage, and later a children's hospital. By 1970 there were sufficient hospitals in the city, so the place became a day centre and outpatient clinic.

Some 15,000 Palestinians visit annually for vaccinations and the treatment of simple ailments and injuries. The centre also provides training for Palestinian mothers and evaluation and therapy for children trying to cope physically and psychologically with the strain of living under Israeli occupation.

The Palestinian Centre for Counselling is a few steps from the Spafford Centre. Founded in 1983, it has clinical and educational departments and works with troubled youth. Since an estimated 90 per cent of children growing up here exhibit aggression and suffer from learning disabilities, there is great need for facilities like the Spafford Centre and the Centre for Counselling.

Both are being renovated by the Welfare Association, a Geneva-based Palestinian organisation founded in 1983 to preserve the community's cultural identity, provide humanitarian aid, develop human resources and build civil society.

The association's programme for rebuilding and refurbishing buildings in the Old City was inaugurated in 1994. "Our projects range from $10,000 to $3.5 million. Not all is spent on renovations, some is for furniture and computers," said Khaled. The association's objective is to provide good premises for independent organisations or, as Khaled puts it, to "spin-off" organisations the association helps to establish.

Its most spectacular renovation project is Dar al-Aytam al-Islamiya, the Islamic orphanage and school, a vast complex of buildings belonging to a Mameluke palace constructed over the centuries of Ottoman rule and donated by a wealthy woman as a trust to the Muslim community.

The Welfare Association's technical office conducted thorough studies of the 8,000 square metre site - the second largest in the Old City after the Haram al-Sharif mosque compound - and drew up a comprehensive plan for the rehabilitation of crumbling walls, courtyards, buildings, roofs and domes. Italian experts came to Jerusalem to restore the Mameluke façade of the building and to train Palestinians in the preservation of ancient stone.

Dar al-Aytam al-Islamiya houses dormitories for boys, carpentry workshops, ironmongering and printing workshops, offices and an academic school for 650 pupils. The Irish official aid programme donated the computer lab and panels to divide up a huge multi-purpose hall. The computers are used for training and designing furniture, doors, windows and other items made by the carpentry workshop.

"We do the best work in all of Jerusalem," observes Abu Ibrahim, head of the carpentry department, as he shows us the edge of a perfectly-joined door. The Welfare Association restores residential as well as institutional properties. Its aim is to sustain the Old City's "samoud" or "steadfast" Palestinian community in its historical environment.

This task is made all the more difficult by Israeli administrative obstacles to Palestinian construction and the drive by Israeli settlers to secure housing. In 2004, the association's efforts to rescue and preserve the physical fabric of the Old City was rewarded with the Aga Khan Prize for Architecture.