Great Mosque of Gaza

The Great Mosque of Gaza (Arabic: جامع غزة الكبير‎, transliteration: Jāmaʿ Ghazza al-Kabīr) also known as the Great Omari Mosque (Arabic: المسجد العمري الكبير‎, transliteration: Jāmaʿ al-ʿUmarī al-Kabīr) is the largest and oldest mosque in the Gaza Strip, located in Gaza's old city. Believed to stand on the site of an ancient Philistine temple, the site was used by the Byzantines to erect a church in the 5th century, but after the Muslim conquest in the 7th century, it was transformed into a mosque. Described as "beautiful" by an Arab geographer in the 10th century, the Great Mosque's minaret was toppled in an earthquake in 1033. In 1149, the Crusaders built a cathedral dedicated to John the Baptist, but it was mostly destroyed by the...