Siege and Fall of Jerusalem & the Umariyya Treaty

After the victories at Yarmuk and Damascus, Abu ʿUbayda ibn al-Jarrah ﵁ marched south to lay siege to the last great stronghold of Byzantine Palestine. Jerusalem stood on a plateau of seven hundred fifty meters, enclosed by three valleys. The Tyropoeon in the east, the Hinnom in the south and west. The city walls were old but massive; the gates — Damascus in the north, Jaffa in the west, the Dung Gate in the south, the Lions’ Gate in the east — were manned by Byzantine garrison troops.

Abu ʿUbayda ﵁ chose a methodical encirclement rather than a direct storming assault. He set up his headquarters about two kilometers south of the city, in a siege camp with good water and a view of the southern gates. Three Muslim corps were positioned in a half circle around the western and southern approaches. The northern route to the Byzantine hinterland was sealed off by cavalry, so that no food or reinforcements could reach the city any longer.

Early attacks on the southern gates, the Dung Gate in particular, were repulsed. The Byzantine defenders loosed volleys of arrows and stones from the walls, and the slope up to the walls was so steep that a storming assault became impossible without heavy losses. Abu ʿUbayda ﵁ withdrew his corps and concentrated on starving the city out.

The siege lasted through the winter. Food stores in the city dwindled slowly. The Byzantine emperor could send no relief; after Yarmuk his army in northern Syria was no longer capable of offensive operations. The defenders of Jerusalem gradually realized that they stood alone. In the spring months, voices within began to argue for negotiations.

After three months of siege, Patriarch Sophronius — the spiritual leader of Byzantine Christianity in Palestine — cautiously sought contact with Abu ʿUbayda ﵁. The city council had given him the mandate to explore terms. Sophronius himself was a learned monk, a man of the seventh-century Greek theological tradition, and he was not prepared to surrender the city without guarantees.

In a first series of secret meetings, held at the Dung Gate under flag of truce, Sophronius drew up his terms. Safety for the Christian population. Protection of the churches, in particular the Holy Sepulchre. The right of the clergy to continue their office. Jizyah as a state tax instead of plunder. But the patriarch also demanded that the treaty be signed personally by the khalifah, not by a general. His argument was that the spiritual sanctity of Jerusalem could only be guaranteed by the very highest political authority.

Abu ʿUbayda ﵁ was at first skeptical of this demand. He held full command and the latitude to conclude a normal siege agreement. But he also understood that Sophronius was making a symbolic point, and that the durability of a treaty in a city of such religious weight depended on the credibility of its guarantor. He sent urgent couriers to Medina with the request that ʿUmar ﵁ come in person.

In the meantime Sophronius deepened his preparations. He held meetings with the clergy of the Holy Sepulchre, with the city notables, with the bishops of the surrounding villages. He wanted to present a united position when the khalifah arrived. The defenders on the walls grew less aggressive in the interval; no more volleys at the Muslim lines. Both sides waited for Medina.

ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab ﵁ received the courier from Abu ʿUbayda ﵁ in Medina in early spring. He consulted briefly with ʿAli ibn Abi Talib ﵁, ʿUthman ibn ʿAffan ﵁, and the other members of the Shura, and decided to travel in person. The khalifah left ʿAli ﵁ behind as his deputy in Medina, and set out with a small caravan. One servant, a beloved camel that he and the servant rode by turns, simple bread and water, and the woolen cloak he had worn since his baiʿah as khalifah.

The journey led northwest across the Arabian peninsula, along the old Hijaz–Sham caravan route. Waypoints in the traditions: ʿUqra, Huqra, Tabuk, and then the passage into southern Syria via the Aqaba corridor. The journey took about three to four weeks. Along the way ʿUmar ﵁ passed Muslim garrisons and zakat collectors; he never had himself announced before his arrival, and he never stayed longer than one night in any one place.

At Tabuk, roughly halfway, he met a delegation of Christian notables from Syria who had come out to greet him on the road. He received them briefly and without ceremony, spoke with them about the practical conditions of the Umariyya treaty, and then continued his journey. He also refused an offered horse with ornate trappings and stayed on his camel.

At Jabiya, the Muslim military headquarters in southern Syria, a reception by the commanders awaited him. Abu ʿUbayda ﵁ had handed his siege corps over to subordinates for a few days in order to receive the khalifah in person. Khalid ibn al-Walid ﵁ was also present, as was Yazid ibn Abi Sufyan ﵁. ʿUmar ﵁ saw that they rode in silk cloaks and on saddles dressed with gold, and he rebuked them publicly with the words later quoted in many histories: that they must not forget the hunger and simplicity of Badr.

At Jabiya ʿUmar ﵁ held a military council. He signed administrative ordinances, received reports on the state of affairs in Syria, and prepared for the descent to Jerusalem. From Jabiya it was about a hundred and fifty kilometers south to the holy city.

From Jabiya, ʿUmar ﵁ set out southward, accompanied by Abu ʿUbayda ﵁, Khalid ﵁ and Yazid ﵁. His caravan was small, and he kept the same austere style as on the road. On the north side of the city the Muslim escort rode ahead to inform Sophronius that the khalifah would be within a day’s march.

On the appointed day Sophronius came out of the city through the southern gates, accompanied by his bishops and city notables. He met ʿUmar ﵁ on the ridge south of the city, within sight of the walls and the Temple Mount behind them. The khalifah wore the same patched cloak he wore in Medina. Sophronius, in patriarchal vestments, bowed his head in greeting.

The negotiations lasted half a day. The Treaty of Umariyya was drawn up in concise terms that were later transmitted in various manuscripts. The core terms: the Christian population of Jerusalem shall be free in its worship. The churches shall not be seized, not demolished, and not desecrated. Clergy retain their office. Inhabitants pay jizyah as a regular state tax. No Muslim may occupy a house against the will of a Christian resident. In the city itself, Jews, who had been excluded under Byzantine rule, shall once again be permitted to live.

In return Sophronius handed the keys of the city to ʿUmar ﵁. The treaty was written out in duplicate, one copy for the patriarch, one for the khalifah, and sealed before witnesses. The Muslim commanders and the bishops signed as witnesses. ʿUmar ﵁ swore in public presence that he and his successors would honor the treaty.

The sun stood low on the horizon when the treaty was completed. Sophronius and his delegation returned to the city to open the gates for the following day. ʿUmar ﵁ withdrew with his commanders to Abu ʿUbayda ﵁'s siege camp, and slept on a simple mat under the open sky, as he had on the road.

On the morning after the signing of the treaty, the Dung Gate was opened and ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab ﵁ entered Jerusalem. He walked part of the way on foot; on other stretches he rode his servant’s camel; the traditions transmit both details. Sophronius and the bishops escorted him, and behind them came the Muslim commanders and a small guard. The city’s population stood along the streets in silence; no banners were raised, no bells were rung.

The khalifah walked straight toward the Temple Mount. The mount where the prophet Sulayman ﵇ had once built his house for Allah ﷻ, and where the Prophet ﷺ had set his foot during the Isra wa al-Miʿraj before the ascension, lay beneath a centuries-old layer of rubble and refuse. The Byzantines had deliberately neglected the site as a symbol of the end of the Jewish temple ritual.

ʿUmar ﵁ gazed at the heap of rubble in silence. He asked for a cloth and knelt down himself, with the bishops and his officers around him, and helped shift the first stones aside with his own hands. The Sahabah ﵃ followed his example; within a few hours a section of the rock platform had been cleared. Sophronius, so the sources relate, stood apart and said to one of his bishops: “This is the abomination of desolation of which Daniel ﵇ spoke.”

On the cleared rock platform ʿUmar ﵁ performed two rakaʿat. He then had plans drawn for a simple covered space on the south side of the platform, where the Muslim community could perform its prayer. Its construction would be completed under his successors; it ultimately became the Masjid al-Aqsa, and on the rock platform itself, under ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Marwan, the Qubbat as-Sakhrah was later erected.

ʿUmar ﵁ remained in Jerusalem for several days. He met the city notables, Jewish and Christian, arranged the governance, and gave the order that the Jewish families living in exile or in the mountains could return. At the Holy Sepulchre he refused to pray inside the church building, in order — according to the traditions — to avoid the legal precedent that Muslims might later claim the building as a mosque. He prayed outside before the door, on the spot where the Masjid ʿUmar was later erected.

Then the khalifah returned to Medina, along the same route by which he had come. He left Abu ʿUbayda ﵁ behind as governor of Bilad ash-Sham, and the Treaty of Umariyya became the model for the treatment of Christian and Jewish subject peoples in all later Muslim conquests.