Belgrade vs Jerusalem

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Belgrade ( BEL-grayd; Serbian: Београд, romanized: Beograd, lit. 'White City', pronounced [beǒɡrad] (listen); names in other languages) is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It's located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers as well as the crossroads of the Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. Nearly 1.7 million people live within the administrative limits of the Town of Belgrade, a quarter of the total population of Serbia.Belgrade is among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in Europe and the World. One of the most important prehistoric cultures of Europe, the Vinča culture, evolved within the Belgrade area in the 6th millennium BC. In antiquity, Thraco-Dacians inhabited the region and, after 279 BC, Celts settled the town, naming it Singidūn. It was conquered by the Romans under the reign of Augustus and given Roman town rights in the mid-2nd century. It had been settled by the Slavs in the 520s, and changed hands several times between the Byzantine Empire, the Frankish Empire, the Bulgarian Empire, and the Kingdom of Hungary before it became the seat of the Serbian king Stefan Dragutin in 1284. Belgrade served as capital of the Serbian Despotate during the reign of Stefan Lazarević, and then his successor Đurađ Branković returned into the Hungarian king in 1427. Noon bells in support of the Hungarian army against the Ottoman Empire during the siege in 1456 have remained a widespread church heritage to this day. In 1521, Belgrade was conquered by the Ottomans and became the chair of the Sanjak of Smederevo. It often passed from Ottoman to Habsburg rule, which saw the destruction of most of the city during the Austro-Ottoman wars.

In the period after the Serbian Revolution, Belgrade was named the capital of Serbia in 1841. Northern Belgrade stayed the southernmost Habsburg post until 1918, when it was attached to the city, because of former Austro-Hungarian lands becoming the role of the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes after World War I. Belgrade was the capital of Yugoslavia from its creation in 1918 to its dissolution in 2006. In a fatally strategic position, the city was battled over in 115 wars and razed 44 times, being bombed five times and surrounded many times.Being Serbia's primate city, Belgrade has special administrative status within Serbia. It's the seat of the central authorities, administrative bodies, and government ministries, as well as home of almost all the largest Serbian companies, media, and scientific associations. Belgrade is categorized as a Beta-Global City. The town is home to the Clinical Centre of Serbia, one of the hospital complexes with the biggest capacity in the world, the Church of Saint Sava, one of the biggest Orthodox church buildings, and the Štark Arena, one of those indoor arenas with the biggest capacity in Europe. Belgrade hosted major international events like the Danube River Conference of 1948, the first Non-Aligned Movement Summit (1961), the first major gathering of the OSCE (1977--1978), Eurovision Song Contest (2008), as well as sports events like the first FINA World Aquatics Championships (1973), UEFA Euro (1976), Summer Universiade (2009) and EuroBasket three-times (1961, 1975, 2005).

Source: Wikipedia

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Jerusalem (; Hebrew: יְרוּשָׁלַיִם‎ Yerushaláyim; Arabic: القُدس‎ al-Quds or Bayt al-Maqdis, also spelled Baitul Muqaddas) is a Town in the Middle East, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea.

It is among the oldest cities in the world, and is considered holy to the three major Abrahamic religions--Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority claim Jerusalem as their capital, as Israel maintains its primary governmental institutions there and the State of Palestine ultimately foresees it as its seat of power; however, neither claim is broadly recognized internationally.Throughout its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed at least two, besieged 23 times, captured and recaptured 44 times, and attacked 52 times. The component of Jerusalem known as the City of David shows first signs of settlement in the 4th millennium BCE, in the shape of encampments of nomadic shepherds. In the Canaanite period (14th century BCE), Jerusalem was named as Urusalim on ancient Egyptian tablets, probably meaning"City of Shalem" following a Canaanite deity. During the Israelite period, significant construction activity in Jerusalem began in the 9th century BCE (Iron Age II), and in the 8th century the city developed into the religious and administrative centre of the Kingdom of Judah. In 1538, the city walls were rebuilt for a last time around Jerusalem under Suleiman the Magnificent, when it was part of the Ottoman Empire. Today those walls specify the Old City, which has been traditionally divided into four-quarters--known since the early 19th century as the Armenian, Christian, Jewish, and Muslim Quarters. The Old City became a World Heritage Site in 1981, and is on the List of World Heritage in Danger. Since 1860 Jerusalem has grown far beyond the Old City's boundaries. In 2015, Jerusalem had a population of some 850,000 residents, including roughly 200,000 secular Jewish Israelis, 350,000 Haredi Jews and 300,000 Palestinians. In 2016, the population was 882,700, of which Jews included 536,600 (60.8percent ), Muslims 319,800 (36.2percent ), Christians 15,800 (1.8percent ), and 10,300 unclassified (1.2percent ).According to the Bible, King David conquered the city from the Jebusites and established it as the capital of the united kingdom of Israel, and his son, King Solomon, commissioned the construction of the First Temple.



Modern scholars argue that Jews branched out of the Canaanite peoples and culture through the creation of a distinct monolatrous -- and later monotheistic -- religion centered on El/Yahweh, These foundational events, straddling the dawn of the 1st millennium BCE, assumed central symbolic significance for the Jewish men and women. The sobriquet of holy city (עיר הקודש, transliterated'ir haqodesh) was attached to Jerusalem in post-exilic times. The holiness of Jerusalem in Christianity, conserved from the Septuagint which Christians adopted as their own authority, was bolstered by the New Testament account of Jesus's crucifixion there. In Sunni Islam, Jerusalem is the third-holiest city, after Mecca and Medina. In Islamic tradition, in 610 CE it became the first qibla, the focal point for Muslim prayer (salat), and Muhammad made his Night Journey there ten years later, ascending to heaven where he speaks to God, according to the Quran. Because of this, despite having an area of only 0.9 square kilometres (0.35 sq mi), the Old City is home to many sites of seminal religious significance, among them the Temple Mount with its Western Wall, Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Outside the Old City stands the Garden Tomb. Today, the status of Jerusalem is still one of the core issues in the Israeli--Palestinian conflict. During the 1948 Arab--Israeli War, West Jerusalem was among the areas captured and later annexed by Israel while East Jerusalem, including the Old City, was captured and later annexed by Jordan. Israel captured East Jerusalem from Jordan during the 1967 Six-Day War and subsequently annexed it into Jerusalem, together with additional neighboring land. Among Israel's Basic Laws, the 1980 Jerusalem Law, refers to Jerusalem as the Nation's undivided capital. All branches of the Israeli authorities are located in Jerusalem, including the Knesset (Israel's parliament), the residences of the Prime Minister (Beit Aghion) and President (Beit HaNassi), and the Supreme Court. As the international community rejects the annexation as illegal and treats East Jerusalem as Palestinian territory occupied by Israel, Israel's claim of sovereignty over East Jerusalem is poorer than its claim over West Jerusalem.

Source: Wikipedia