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Israel Kimche was born in the city during the British Mandate and lives there today. The thoroughness of his knowledge of the city's population trends reveals his past career as a city planner.
He can currently be found at The Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies, a not-for-profit think tank examining issues associated with contemporary Israeli society including the economy, social policy, regional planning and the peace process. His expertise earned him a role as advisor to the Israeli delegation at the Camp David negotiations.
Kimche got his start in city planning in 1963 and was among the architects of a plan for the integration of the then divided western and eastern halves of the city. According to Kimche, the planning team always assumed the city would be reunited. That assumption was prescient: as a result of the 1967 "Six Day War," Israel extended its control over all of Jerusalem (note: The international community does not recognize Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem).
As part of his work at the institute, Kimche grapples with the implications of the reintegration he helped plan. It is his job to propose ways to make Jerusalem a more functional city for all its inhabitants. He also represents on maps the various proposals for dividing the city between areas of Israeli and Palestinian control.
He is skeptical that redivision could work.
Given the current demographic dispersion of the population, he believes it would be impossible to administer effectively and would further balkanize the city into Arab and Jewish controlled enclaves. Instead, Kimche favors the indefinite postponement of final status talks and advocates expanding power sharing with Jerusalem's Palestinian community and finding common ground. "Instead of separation let's speak of cooperation and work together."
The Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies
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