Recupero urbano nelle citta storiche del Territorio palestinese occupato = Rehabilitation planning in the historical towns of the occupied Palestinian territory

Issue n°7 of EdA is organized as a set of thematic sections. The first section describes the geo-political context in the occupied Palestinian territory where most of the on-going rehabilitation plans (Fontana, Amiry) are concentrated. It also highlights the terms reached with the declarations of the Bethlehem Charter, the charter for the safeguarding of Palestinian historic towns and urban landscapes adopted by local administrations in December 2008 (Niglio). The second section illustrates the results of the first phase of work related to the Bethlehem Area Conservation and Management Plan aimed at including the town of Bethlehem on the UNESCO’s World Heritage list. This section presents different methodological and operative aspects of the Plan: the historic landscape in its relation to the context of the urban outskirts (Serrini), the cultural anthropic landscape (Barone), the programme of developing skills through technical cooperation (Palazzo), and the technological tools for urban planning (Gentili). A third section presents a selection of urban regeneration studies, plans and projects, realized and/or in progress within the historic towns of the occupied Palestinian territory: Sabastya (Benelli, Hamdan), East Jerusalem (Touqan), BirZeit (Muhawi), Hebron (Qawasmi, Maraqa), Nablus (Arafat), and Bethlehem (Palazzo, Nasser). Photographs by Federico Busonero accompany each article and present an ‘iconic’ image of the monuments and heritage sites. Also included is a selection of images by the same photographer illustrating the devastation and desolation of landscapes suspended in time.Elisa Palazz