Nachlaot

Nachlaot (Hebrew: נחלאות, also Naḥlaʾoth) is a cluster of 32 neighbourhoods, many of them courtyard neighborhoods in central Jerusalem surrounding the Mahane Yehuda Market. It is known for its narrow, winding lanes, old-style housing, hidden courtyards and many small synagogues.

Neighborhoods in Nachlaot (plural of nachala, lit. "homestead") include Batei Broide (founded 1902), Batei Goral (founded 1885), Batei Minsk (1895), Batei Munkacs (1931), Batei Rand (1908), Batei Ya'akovson (1902), Bet Ya'acov (1877), Even Yisrael (1875, the oldest of the group), Knesset Yisrael (three neighbourhoods: Knesset A, B and C and founded in 1891, 1903 and 1925 respectively), Mahane Yehuda (1888), Mazkeret Moshe (1882), Mishkenot Yisrael (1876), Nachalat Achim (1892), Nahalat Yaakov (1927), Nahalat Zion (1891), Neve Bezalel (1924), Neve Shalom (1896), Ohel Moshe (1883), Ohel Shlomo (1891), Shaare Rahamim (1906), Shaare Zedek (1889), Sha'arei Yerushalayim (1891), Shevet Achim (1892), Shevet Zedek (1889), Sukkat Shalom (1888), Zikhron Ahim (1929), Zikhron Tuvya (1890), Zikhron Ya'acov (1933), and Zikhron Yosef (1931).

Nahala, plural nahlaot (with different ways of transliterating/spelling it), is a Hebrew word for either heritage or estate.

The neighbourhoods that make up the Nachlaot district were established between 1875 and 1933 outside the walls of the Old City, which was becoming increasingly overcrowded and unsanitary. The first was Even Yisrael, built in 1875 as the sixth neighborhood outside of the walls of Jerusalem's Old City. Its name was derived from the biblical verse (Genesis 49:24): "But his bow abode firm, and the arms of his hands were made supple, by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob, from thence, from the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel." The numerical value of stone ("Even" in Hebrew) also corresponds to the 53 homes first built there. Established that same year to the west of Even Yisrael, Mishkenot Yisrael is the second neighborhood of the Nachlaot. The name comes from a biblical verse (Numbers 24:5): "How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob/Thy dwellings, O Israel." Mazkeret Moshe was founded by Sir Moses Montefiore in 1882 as an Ashkenazi neighborhood. Ohel Moshe is a Sephardi neighborhood established alongside it.

Former Israeli president Yitzhak Navon grew up in Ohel Moshe, and the neighborhood served as the inspiration for his play Bustan Sephardi (Sephardi Orchard). The Banai family, a famous family of actors and singers, lived in Nachlaot. A Syrian Jewish community settled in Nahalat Zion in 1891 and built the Ades Synagogue, which was completed in 1901. Jerusalem's Mahane Yehuda outdoor market is located in Nachlaot. Rabbi Aryeh Levin, known as the "prisoners' rabbi" for his visits to members of the Jewish underground imprisoned in the Russian Compound, lived in Mishkenot Yisrael. Nahalat Ahim, south of Rehov Bezalel, was founded in 1925 for the Yemenite community.

In the wake of gentrification in the area, housing prices have risen steeply.

At one time Nachlaot had a higher concentration of synagogues than anywhere else in the world, around 300 within a radius of just a few blocks.^{[citation needed]} Many of these were not much more than a tiny room with space for only about a dozen worshippers.

The neighborhood includes the Ades Synagogue, Ades Congregation, the flagship of the Syrian Halebi community, as well as the synagogues located in the Knesset Aleph (Beis Rachel), Batei Broide, Batei Munkatz and Batei Rand neighborhoods, following the tradition of Old Jerusalem, including followers of the Vilna Gaon as well as Hasidic tradition.