American Colony Hotel

The American Colony Hotel is a small luxury hotel in East Jerusalem. For several years, it is one of the Leading Hotels of the World.

History

First owner of the building built as a palace complex of buildings was Rabbah Daoud Amin Effendi the Pasha al - Husseini, who used it with his four wives as a family residence. After his death, the building was sold to a religious community of Messianic Christians.

The founders were devout Christians Horatio Spafford, a lawyer, and his wife Anna, who in 1881 from Chicago came to Jerusalem to live in peace in the Holy City and to help people in need. They did not see themselves as missionaries, but wanted to go to the model of the early Christians live. Soon they had gained the trust of the local population because of their charity to Jewish neighbors and the Bedouin from beyond the Jordan opposite. Of the residents, they were called briefly " the Americans ". 1894 followed the 70 Sweden family who also previously lived in the United States. 1896 came another 55 -religionists to do so. This Christian- utopian group was locally known as the American Colony. This relocation was necessary in a larger property. Bought was the above-mentioned palace.

1902, the house was from Jaffa, converted in cooperation with the hotelier Baron Plato Grigorjewitsch Ustinov ( a grandfather of Peter Ustinov ), who in turn was looking for a suitable solution for its European and American visitors in Jerusalem in a hotel. Soon the short " American Colony " said hotel had made ​​a name for western travelers and pilgrims with high standards of quality and comfort.

Still, the hotel is owned by the family of the descendants of Spaffords. The consistently neutral through the family generations attitude left the hotel again become a secret meeting place for Palestinians and Israelis, for discussions and negotiations. So at the hotel the peace talks were started which led to the Oslo agreement of 1993. To date, the American Colony Hotel understood as a neutral zone in the Israeli- Palestinian conflict. Tony Blair, representing the Quartet at the time, the hotel has an office. The employees are also members of Jews, Christians and Muslims, and not only among themselves no problems, but are friends with each other to some extent.

Hotel guests have included Winston Churchill, Leon Uris, Lawrence of Arabia, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Tony Blair, Philip Roth, Peter O'Toole, Marc Chagall, Alec Guinness, Graham Greene, John le Carré and Richard Gere. In order to protect the latter from the many female fans, had, as the hotel manager in reportage and travel world travel magazine in November 2010, the police are brought in to help.