Mounting the Temple

In 1947, the United Nations voted for the partition of British Mandate Palestine into three separate entities: a Jewish state, an Arab state and Jerusalem as a separate legal entity, a corpus separatum. That was the plan.

Tish’a Beav, is a day of mourning, on which religious Jews fast and remember the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. Eid El-Ad’ha is the Feast of Sacrifice, the Muslim feast ending the annual pilgrimage to Mecca.  Such days are always an opportunity for extremists on both sides to stir trouble. This year is no exception. Moreover, this year, both holidays fall during the same period. And so the Muslim religious authority has closed all other mosques in Jerusalem to force those Muslims who wish to pray to come in droves to the El-Aksah mosque, and right-wing Israeli politicians and activists are pushing and cajoling the government and the police to open the area for Jews to celebrate. The Chief Rabbi meanwhile opined that according to Jewish law it is forbidden for Jews to enter the area.

What a miserable lot they are – whatever god they maintain they believe in. And all those that follow, hollow and shallow, “believers” that care more for real estate than for human values of peace, love and mercy. Worst of all, are those cold-blooded politicians, secular and religious, who manipulate those primitive feelings of “their people”.

And how right the UN was in 1947, to suggest a corpus separatum. Instead – borrowing from Shakespeare – we have

Jerusalem on Fire

One of the interesting aspects of the original 1947 partition plan that the United Nations had envisaged and decided for Palestine, (UN Resolution 181) was the concept that it had for Jerusalem. It called for a corpus separatum, a special international regime, to be established for the city of Jerusalem.

As we know, this UN resolution was accepted by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs. That was the death of the boundaries set by that resolution.   

Last week there was again an outbreak of violence in the holy basin, an area that both Jews and Muslims consider to be holy. The incident was badly handled by Israel’s right wing prime minister, who is besieged by competing populists in his cabinet, whilst the Arabs managed to play their cards cleverly. Israel lost face in this latest round. It had to dismantle, sensible but not sensitively installed security measures it had put in place (metal detectors and security cameras), and return to the status quo ante, hoping to lower the flames, which the Muslim waqf, the Islamic trust that manages the Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem, has been fanning.

The land issues between the Arabs and the Jews in Palestine are complicated enough without the incendiary qualities of religion and sites of worship, which one or more groups consider to be sacred. It would be better to take religion out of the equation. The corpus separatum solution was a good idea.

As things seem now, Israel will not agree to give up its status in Jerusalem. It should.

Say YES to UN observers in Jerusalem

The 1947 UN Partition Plan for Palestine foresaw a special status for the greater Jerusalem area, as a corpus separatum, under a special international regime and administered by the United Nations. Unfortunately, this resolution was never implemented.

Now, because of the current tension in Jerusalem, France is promoting a plan to deploy international observers at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.

Sounds like a good idea to me. But, Israel objects.

Having one-sidedly annexed East Jerusalem, Israel wants to avoid any act that might question its self-declared sovereignty over the city that contains sites holy to all three monotheistic religions. Sadly, the US will side with Israel on this matter and thereby prevent the necessary Security Council resolution.