Central District, Israel · Asia
Ramla is worth a stop: 10 minutes from Sitriyya, 38km from Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
Ramla is in Central District, Israel, with about 76,000 people. You drive on the right here. The nearest town is Sitriyya, about 4 km away.
Ramla (Hebrew: רַמְלָה, romanized: Ramla), also known as Ramle (Arabic: الرملة, romanized: ar-Ramla, Palestinian Arabic: [ɪrˈrɑmle]), is a city in the Central District of Israel. Ramle is one of Israel's mixed cities, with significant numbers of both Jews and Arab citizens of Israel.
The city was founded in the earlyRead more
8th century by the Umayyad caliph Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik as the capital of Jund Filastin, the district he governed in Bilad al-Sham before becoming caliph in 715. The city's strategic and economic value derived from its location at the intersection of the Via Maris, connecting Cairo with Damascus, and the road connecting the Mediterranean port of Jaffa with Jerusalem. It rapidly overshadowed the adjacent city of Lydda, whose inhabitants were relocated to the new city. Not long after its establishment, Ramla developed as the commercial centre of Palestine, serving as a hub for pottery, dyeing, weaving, and olive oil, and as the home of numerous Muslim scholars. Its prosperity was lauded by geographers in the 10th–11th centuries, when the city was ruled by the Fatimids and Seljuks.
It lost its role as a provincial capital shortly before the arrival of the First Crusade (c. 1099), after which it became the scene of various battles between the crusaders and Fatimids in the first years of the 12th century. Later that century, it became the centre of a lordship in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, a crusader state established by Godfrey of Bouillon. The city declined in the Ottoman period, and 19th-century visitors described it as a town of only a few thousand inhabitants in a state of decay.
Ramla had an almost exclusively Arab population before most were expelled during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The town was subsequently repopulated by Jewish immigrants. Today, Ramla is one of Israel's mixed cities, with a population 76% Jewish and 24% Arab.
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Discover famous landmarks, scenic roads, and more near Ramla.
Within an hour or so of Ramla: Abu Hassan (Ali Karavan) (17 km), Old Jaffa (18 km), Yad Vashem (34 km), Church of the Holy Sepulchre (38 km).
The nearest famous roads are King's Highway and Scorpions Ascent (Ma'ale Akrabim).
Ramla is in Central District, Israel, about 4 km from Sitriyya.
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Places within a drive of Ramla. Keep the ones you like and add them to your trip.
8 notable places within an hour's drive.
restaurant
A Jaffa hummus counter running since 1971, famous for masabacha made with whole chickpeas and extra tahini. It sells out and closes by mid-afternoon, and the queue starts well before that.
17 km · about 20 min drive
landmark
One of the oldest port cities in the world with 4,000 years of history, now an artists' quarter with galleries, restaurants, and views of Tel Aviv's skyline.
18 km · about 20 min drive
museum
Israel's official memorial to the Holocaust, with deeply moving exhibits and a striking modernist museum built into a mountainside.
34 km · about 40 min drive
cathedral
Christianity's holiest site, built on the traditional locations of Jesus's crucifixion and burial.
38 km · about 45 min drive
landmark
A walled sacred city of one square kilometer containing holy sites for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam within four historic quarters.
39 km · about 45 min drive
landmark
The holiest site where Jews can pray, a 2,000-year-old limestone remnant of the Second Temple retaining wall in the Old City of Jerusalem.
39 km · about 45 min drive
landmark
The iconic gold-domed Islamic shrine on the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif, built in 691 CE over the sacred Foundation Stone.
39 km · about 45 min drive
cathedral
One of the oldest continuously operating churches in the world, built over the traditional birthplace of Jesus.
41 km · about 45 min drive
Other places to explore near Ramla.
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