Lod, also known as al-Ludd and formerly known as Lydda or Diospolis, is a city in central Israel, located 9.3 miles southeast of Tel Aviv. It was first settled by humans in 5600 BC, and, by the 15th century BC, it was a Canaanite town. From the 5th century BC to 70 AD, Lydda was a center of Jewish scholarship and commerce. In 43 BC, the Roman governor of Syria, Gaius Cassius Longinus, sold the inhabitants of Lydda into slavery, but they were freed two years later by Mark Antony. In 66 AD, during the First Jewish-Roman War, the Roman general Cestius Gallus razed Lydda, which was later occupied by Vespasian in 68 AD. During the Kitos War of 115-117 AD, the Romans captured the rebel stronghold at Lydda and executed several of the captured Jewish rebel leaders. In 200 AD, Roman emperor Septimius Severus elevated Lydda to a city with the name "Diospolis", and, by that point, most of its inhabitants were Christian. In the 6th century AD, Diospolis was renamed Georgiopolis in honor of Saint George, who lived there as a young man. In 636 AD, the Arab general Amr ibn al-As conquered Georgiopolis and renamed it "al-Ludd" in honor of its original name. It served as the capital of the Rashidun military district of Palestine before its seat was moved to Ramla in 715, as was the population of al-Ludd. al-Ludd thus lost its importance and fell into decay, but it was still known for its Church of St. George, where it was prophesied that Jesus would return to slay the Antichrist. The Crusaders of the First Crusade conquered the city in 1099 and renamed it to Lydda, and, while it was briefly conquered by the Egyptian sultan Saladin, the Crusaders reconquered it in 1191 during the Third Crusade. The Crusaders built a cathedral which was later converted into the Great Mosque of Ramla, and it became the seat of a Latin Christian diocese which later became a titular see of the Roman Catholic Church. In 1267, Lydda was reconquered by the Mamluk sultan Baibars, and it became a pleasant village with an active Friday mosque; it also became a station on the postal route from Cairo to Damascus. By 1596, Ottoman-era al-Ludd had 241 households and 14 bachelors who were Muslims and 233 Christian households. By 1869, al-Ludd was home to 55 Catholics, 1,940 Orthodox Greeks, 5 Protestants, and 4,850 Muslims. In 1892, al-Ludd became home to the first railroad station in the entire region. By 1922, al-Ludd had 8,103 inhabitants (7,166 Muslims, 11 Jews, and 926 Christians), which rose to 11,250 in 1931 (10,002 Muslims, 28 Jews, 1,210 Christians, and 10 Baha'i). Until 1948, al-Ludd was an Arab town with 18,500 Muslims and 1,500 Christians, but it was captured by Israel during the First Arab-Israeli War, and between 250 and 1,700 of its Arabs were killed during the Nakba. From August 1948 onwards, Jewish refugees from Arab countries came to settle in the now-Jewish town of "Lod", with waves of them coming from Morocco and Tunisia, then from Ethiopia, and then from the USSR. By 2019, Lod had a population of 77,223.
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