In the news because of Jihadist overrunning of the city, it has a Jewish history.

(For more topics, see Israel's History - A Picture a Day website)

Jihadi forces overran Mosul, Iraq's second largest city, this week. Analysts explain Mosul's significance as the center of Iraq's oil-rich areas, the gateway for the Sunni radicals to attack Baghdad, and a debacle for the U.S.-supported Iraqi army.



But Mosul also has an ancient history. It was the Biblical city of Nineveh, so large that the Book of Jonah describes it as a "great city of three days journey in breadth."

"Jewish Cobblers Repairing Shoes for Arabs, near Mosul, Mesopotamia" (Iraq) (Credit: Keystone-Mast Collection,

California Museum of Photography at UCR ARTSblock, University of California, Riverside)

The Assyrian King Sennacherib built a massive palace there on the banks of the Tigris River.



We present pictures of Mosul 80 years ago and of Jews of Mosul approximately 100 years ago.



Read here a 2007 account of a Jewish chaplain from the US Army's 101st Airborne who discovered the remnants of Mosul's Jewish community.



Mosul, Iraq, 1932 (Library of Congress)

Mosul and the Tigris in the background, 1932 (Library of Congress)

Sennacherib's castle, Mosul, Iraq, 1932 (Library of Congress) See also here



