Knesset Yisrael

Knesset Yisrael (Hebrew: כנסת ישראל‎, Ashkenazi pronunciation Knesses Yisroel, lit. "Community of Israel"), also known as Knesset, is the name of a group of three former courtyard neighborhoods in central Jerusalem. Known as Knesset Aleph, Knesset Bet, and Knesset Gimmel (or Old Knesset, Middle Knesset, and New Knesset), the housing project was planned by the Vaad HaKlali Knesset Yisrael (Central Committee of Knesset Yisrael) and funded by overseas Jewish donors. The houses were completed in stages from 1892 to 1926. Beneficiaries of the housing were poor Haredi Ashkenazi families and Torah scholars connected to the Central Committee kolel system. Today Knesset Yisrael is part of the Nachlaot neighborhood.

The name Knesset Yisrael is a Talmudic expression referring to the Jewish people as a whole.

The three neighborhoods of Knesset Yisrael – Knesset Aleph, Knesset Bet, and Knesset Gimmel – lie north of Betzalel Street and straddle both sides of HaNetziv Street.

In response to the overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in the Old City of Jerusalem, and the influx of new immigrants to Jerusalem in the late 19th century, 40 new neighborhoods were built outside the Old City walls between 1880 and 1900. Knesset Yisrael was one of the "kolel neighborhoods" built on behalf of European Ashkenazi immigrants who were being supported by charity funds collected from their countrymen. In 1888 the Central Committee, which oversaw the distribution of charity funds to Ashkenazi families, decided to purchase land and construct housing for its members.

Their chosen location – a parcel of land south of Jaffa Road and adjacent to the newly built Jewish neighborhoods of Mishkenot Yisrael and Mazkeret Moshe – turned out to be the site for the planned terminus of the Jaffa–Jerusalem railway. Land prices skyrocketed as Christian groups from Germany, Greece, and Armenia sought to establish neighborhoods adjacent to the train station. Hopelessly outbid, the Central Committee members tried to stall the legal proceedings in the Turkish municipality, and called on the Jewish community to engage in fasting and prayers in synagogues and by the graves of tzadikim in Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed, and Tiberias. Several months later, the French company building the railway announced that it had decided to move the Jerusalem station to a point further south. The Christian groups rushed to buy land at the new site (later known as the German Colony), and the Central Committee was able to purchase the property it wanted for the neighborhood of Knesset Yisrael.

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