‘We came to this land to build and be built’

Abstract

Aliyah, the great Jewish migration resulting from popularization of Zionism, brought end to the Jewish diaspora in the form, in which it was known before. The massive migration brought large numbers of new settlers to the area of Palestine with the aim of (re)creating their country – Israel. A new country required new infrastructure, architecture and a new national identity which would unify Jews after 2000 years of diaspora. This paper aims to examinate the interrelations of the last two; architecture and national identity as well as the other, main factors influencing the development of architecture in Israel.
The research is set up around six preselected architects of European background. Each couple represents a different era-style in Israeli architecture. For each of the architects a few buildings will be selected and analyzed for: relations to the architect’s background experiences, upbringing and their period of education, influences from the preexisting architecture of Palestine, adaptation to the local climate new to the European architect, and finally, the State defined laws and trends as a means of building national identity. The paper includes also a discussion regarding the development of Palestinian architecture in context of the Israeli influence.
The analysis is conducted using primary sources, mainly building photographs, but also drawings, diagrams, postcards, street signs and literary sources. Simultaneously, an investigation regarding what role these aforementioned factors played in the process of building the national identity of Israel is supported also by secondary sources – books, articles and journal publications.
The main results suggest high dependence of the Israeli built environment on the State defined laws and trends. A less intense dependence is found in the context of the rest of the factors. As a consequence, however, the built environment and national identity in context of architecture seem to be mainly influenced by the State defined laws and trends and the architecture of Palestine, as the various, individual backgrounds of architects cannot create a uniform identity, while the continuous references towards the Palestinian architecture can.