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Yehudayoff-Hefetz Palace (Armon), Jerusalem

Description

Background: The Bukharan Quarter, also called HaBukharim Quarter, is a neighborhood in central Jerusalem. As the name implies, the neighborhood was first established by Buhkaran Jews beginning in the late 1860s but gradually grew to become a Pan-Persian Jewish area, hosting Jewish communities from Iran and Afghanistan alongside Bukharan Jews[1][2]. The creation of the neighborhood was part of a larger process of Jewish areas being established in Jerusalem outside the confines of the Old City[3]. The history of Bukharian desires to migrate to Eretz Israel actually hails from developments almost a century prior when Yosef Maman, a Sephardic rabbi initially from Morocco (but had resettled in Safed to teach at a yeshiva), was traveling to various Jewish communities to collect funds for yeshivot in Eretz Israel. After reaching Buhkara, Mamon would relent that the established Jewish community of Bukhara was sorely lacking proper study/understanding of Torah/halacha. Maman would go on to become the spiritual leader of the Bukharan Jewish community, providing them with Sephardic religious rites that replaced their old Persian rites. Their utilization of such rites was a result of isolation from surrounding Jewish populations, specifically from the Buhkara Emirati’s closed door policies[4]. Maman would establish many yeshivas in Bukhara; however, an integral part of his teachings was a support for Bukharan Jews to visit and return to Eretz Israel[5]. 

As early as 1827 and until 1860, many Bukharan Jews were making multi-month long visits to Eretz Israel but not settling in the land and opting to return to Bukhara[6]. These trips would establish the groundwork for the first true settlement of Bukharan Jews in Jerusalem in 1868 when Bukharan Jews from Russian Turkestan would make the trek to the Holy Land for their new home[7]. Like many of their Russian Ashkenazi counterparts, seven members of the Bukharan community would form a Hovevei Zion Association for the Bukharan communities of Nuhkara, Samarkand, and Tashkent. This association specifically bought around 40 houses northwest of Mea She’arim, an area that would become the Bukharan quarter, which they would name Rehovot[8]. The group’s charter specified a desire to build the quarter in parallel to the style of Europe’s largest cities, specifically following neo-Gothic and Italian architectural styles alongside traditional Jewish building styles including Moorish arches alongside a heavy utilization of Magen Davids and Hebrew inscriptions in the inside of the buildings. These homes were atypically large, possessing usually two stories and a courtyard (alongside streets triple the average width for such an era)[9]. The quarter as a whole was initially particularly affluent, being filled with Bukharan Jews who amassed wealth from mercantile, cotton, and tea trades in Central Asia. 

The original population began to dissipate in the early of the 20th century and gradually grew to become a Sephardi-Haredi dominated area, with most of the houses/synagogues being utilized by such a population as well[10]. 

Elisha Yehudayoff: Elisha Yehudayoff was an affluent Bukharan Jew who, with the help of his son-in-law Yisrael Hefetz, would create the Armon, the grand mansion in heart of central West Jerusalem (which would become known as a symbol of the contributions of early Bukharan migrants on the city)[11]. Yehudayoff was born in 1853 in Bukhara and he would amass a sizable fortune as a guild merchant. Yehudayoff would make aliyah in 1907, the same year of that construction began on the Armon[12].

In 1917 during WW1, Yehudayoff and his family were expelled from the Armon by the Turkish army, who utilized his mansion as a base of operations in the southern Levant. Yehudayoff would work with British soldiers to form a resistance to the Turkish army in order to reclaim his property[13]. He would pass away in 1940,  leaving behind seven children who would not retain respective control over the Armon, instead relinquishing control to private/religious schooling instiutions[14].

The Armon/ “Palace”: The Palace, also known as the Armon or Beit Yehudayoff-Hefetz, is a luxurious building located on Rechov Ezra which was constructed in 1907, although completion of the project would take nearly 10 years. Created using local limestone and imported Italian marble, “the Palace” was designed in a Renaissance style with a mixture of Italian ornaments and Jewish symbolism/art present on the interior. The facade of the building was supposed to directly parallel Rome’s 17th century Capitoline Museum. The building is three stories high with around 1,100 square meters of base, making this one of the largest estates in Jerusalem from the early 20th century[15]. As both the previous Buhkaran community and current Haredi population will illuminate, “the Palace’s” immense size can be attributed to the intended utilization of the mansion for housing the Messiah, whose arrival was believed to be soon at the time of construction.

From the outside, one is privy to an image of intricate stone carvings, while, from the inside, one could easily get lost in the building’s thirty beautiful yet gigantic rooms[16]. Once entering, one should likely notice unusually high ceilings and marble-faced walls. For cultural elements, although no longer utilized for such a purpose, the Armon possesses a mikvah at its lowest level and a sukkah-based porch with an adjustable roof[17].

Various historical events subsequently have occurred at the Armon. The first and most notable event that would distance the Armon away from its original purpose was its capture and utilization by the Turkish army during WW1 (thus expelling the Yehudayoffs from the establishment). The Turkish army even utilized the building as their headquarters in that area of the Levant. Following British victory in the war, the World Zionist Organization would utilize this building to hold a reception under Chaim Weizmann for the memory of General Allenby (followed by the building hosting a Passover Seder for Jewish soldiers). The British High Commissioner for the Mandate of Palestine, Herbert Samuel, was hosted at the Armon at the Sukkah on the porch. The inauguration for the Chief Rabbinate of the Mandate was held in the Armon, hence where Rav Kook and Rav Meir would be formally inducted into their roles[18]. During the Israeli War for Independence, the group Etzel utilized the lowest level of the Armon as a secret base of operations, with David Spitzer of Igrun carving the words “imperialism out” in the building.

Today, the building is in a degenerative state, along with many other buildings in the Bukharan quarter, and is mainly utilized as a location for two religious girls schools (Bnos Rachol and Ohr Batyah)[19]. 

Jerusalem, Israel

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