"Mar Elias" monastery was built during the crusades period (1099-1260 AD).
This is a Greek orthodox monastery that lies on the outskirts of the Jerusalem- Hevron road and its height is about 800 meters above the sea level the name of the monastery "Mar Elias" is actually Eliyahu the profits Arabic name.
Legend has it that the monastery is the place where Elijah the prophet took rest during his fleet from jezebel on his way to "Horev Mountain". The view from the monastery is of the breathtaking yehuda desert. It is there where the renowned British painter" William Holman Hunt" would sit and paint the desert's landscape.
Hunt's house was one of the first homes of the city of Jerusalem outside the walls; today the house is located on 64 "ha'nevieim "street. The poet "Rachel" later lived in that house. In the entrance to the monastery there is a stone bench that hunt's wife built at the beginning of the British mandate period (1917-1948 AD) in memory of the painter. On the bench that we see till this day biblical passages engraved in Hebrew, Arabic, English and Greek.