Good location for this 2 star hotel, being close to old city -15 min walk-and nearby Jaffa road with restraunts, but rooms small despite booking superior room-they were clean however. No pool. Staff able to book trips or taxis if required. Breakfast adequate. You may do better in Jerusalem but reasonably priced overall.

I am an independent traveler and looked long and hard for a reasonably-priced hotel in Jerusalem that had at least ok reviews on Trip Advisor. I thought I had found a reasonable option in the Palatin Hotel, but I was disappointed overall.
First of all, the hotel has no map of its location on its website, and online maps of Jerusalem are basically impossible to find (check Google maps for example!). The owners should put a map up as this made the hotel very difficult to find, even after asking many people for directions and help.
Second, my room was on the third (fourth for Americans) floor. These rooms, unlike the second floor rooms (which are in pictures others have posted here), have NOT seen renovation (other than yellow paint sloppily applied to the walls) in years. The blue carpet (not visible in my pictures unfortunately) was filthy and worn. I mean filthy.
Third, the hotel advertises free wifi, which it indeed has. But wifi reception was non-existent on the third floor. I did use the wifi from the lobby without trouble, however.
Fourth, the shower was the worst shower I have ever had in a hotel and I have stayed in hotels all over the world. The water came out of pin-prick size holes and any attempt to increase the volume of water coming out to a level where you could actually shower meant that needle-like streams of water would come out, which were painful. If this weren't enough, the shower had an L-shaped curtain and the shower was so small that as you attempted to shower, the curtain would stick to your body. Needless to say, I didn't look forward to showering.
Fifth, the reception staff is somewhat abrupt and a little curt at points.
Sixth, the breakfast buffet is weak. The cereals are the type of cheap grain cereals that immediately turn to a pasty mush when milk is added and the juices are fake.
Seventh, the hotel's location is decent until the breaking of the Sabbath on Saturday night. At about 8 p.m. (and lasting well past midnight), Israeli youths drink beer, play extremely loud music from their cars parked on the pedestrian street out front, and throw and break beer bottles, all while the Israeli police force (which is omnipresent in Jerusalem) does nothing.
Overall, I only stayed two nights here and survived. If I had booked a longer stay here, I would have checked out early, which I have never considered doing at a hotel in all of my travels. To top it all off, the hotel was more expensive than I pay for hotels of far higher quality in Jordan, Germany, France, Hong Kong, South Africa, etc. I have never given a bad review to a hotel, but this my first.

The lobby is one floor up from the street and the rooms are on floors above that and there is no elevator so this hotel wouldn't be suitable for someone who can't handle the stairs. This pleasant hotel is in a central location walking distance to the Old City and even closer to shopping on Ben Yehuda.

The hotel staff was friendly and helpful. When I checked in, the clerk immediately offered to carry my bag up to my room and when I was leaving the clerk also carried it down.

I booked a superior room which was small but very fresh and nice. There was a bench for my suitcase and a small desk where I used my laptop. The bathroom is compact but very usable - the shower enclosure folds back against the wall when not in use to make a bit more space.

Breakfast was simple but good - cereal, bread, cheeses, tomato, cucumber and fruit and the breakfast room is sunny and cheerful.

Another reviewer mentioned smelly cleaning products - I'm quite sensitive to fragrances and didn't detect any.

If you value a central location more than a large fancy hotel room and can handle stair, this hotel provides it.

I stayed in the hotel in March 2008 for 4 days 3 nights. What I liked was the location: very close to the walking streets it the city center.

The bad thing is that the rooms are very worn: shabby carpet which looks like it was never vacuumed, especially in the corners (probably it was, but it is so old that it looks this way), worn bed spread, the bathroom is very basic with small shower that needs to be painted at the very least. And so on... The bed linen was not changed during my stay. If you come in the room shortly after they made it there is strong smell of cheap chemicals they use to clean the bathroom (they leave windows open so it goes away after some time - not sure what they do in summer).

The breakfast was also not very tasty with very limited choice of food, and coffee was of the sort you could expect on a bus station vending machine.

However the staff was friendly and helpful. Also even though they told me that WiFi only works in the reception area but it worked in my room (probably depends on where the room is).

On the whole, considering the price, you got what you paid for. If you don't spend much time in the hotel it is probably OK; otherwise it may be worth considering something more upscale.

Oh well, and pastry in the cafe on the corner few minutes away from the hotel is just amazing!