Gallery
Description
Property Name: El-Jazzar Mosque, Acre
Inventory No: 972-2-35
Date of infill of the inventory form: 2020-09-01
Country (State party): Palestine
Province: Acre
Town: Old city
Geographic coordinates: 32°55’21.71″N
35° 4’13.67″E
Historic Period: Ottoman
Year of Construction: 1781
Style: Ottoman
Original Use: Mosque
Current Use: Mosque
Architect: Unknown
Significance
It is considered one of the most important mosques in northern Palestine, due to its size and the Islamic architecture that highlights its features. It is the second largest mosque in Palestine after the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Al-Jazzar Mosque was built by Ahmad Pasha al-Jazzar, Wali of Acre, in 1781. Al-Jazzar Mosque used stones that were transported from the regions of Caesarea, Athlith, and ٍSur. The mosque contained the Ahmadi School, and in its northeastern corner, it contained the Ahmadi Library. The library and the Ahmadi School continued to be active and graduate students of knowledge until the occurrence of the Nakba in 1948.
Selection Criteria
i. to exhibit an important interchange of human values, over a span of time or within a cultural area of the world, on developments in architecture or technology, monumental arts, town-planning or landscape design
ii. to bear a unique or at least exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization which is living or which has disappeared
vi. to be directly or tangibly associated with events or living traditions, with ideas, or with beliefs, with artistic and literary works of outstanding universal significance
State of Preservation
As a result of the 1948 war, some bullets penetrated the lead sheets covering the dome. The mosque administrators were forced to paint the outer surface of the dome with clay and cement, then it was painted in a dark green colour. However, it was re-coating it with lead sheets again, in 1994, and it is still like this today. The mosque was exposed to a fire on 01 August 2016, so that the prayer hall was completely burnt down, in addition to the damage to the western outer wall of the mosque, and the windows were burned and their windows shattered. Currently, the mosque is in urgent need of restoration as there is a slope in the mosque’s minaret.
References
Yusuf, Faraj Allah Ahmad. 2011. Mosques of Palestine: under the Zionist occupation. Dar Al-Qalam, 2011.
Web sources
Archnet website https://archnet.org/
The Palestinian Encyclopaedia website: https://www.palestinapedia.net/
The Palestinian News & Info Agency website: http://info.wafa.ps/