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Al-Ahram Weekly 31 August - 6 September 2000 Issue No. 497 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 31 August - 6 September 2000 Issue No. 497
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters No peace with it, no peace without
By Tahseen Bashir*Jerusalem is not what many people imagine it to be -- a single, unchanging city. There are many Jerusalems. The main problem seems to be the area within the old city which the Arabs call Al-Quds Al-Sharif and the Israelis call Orshalim. Claims overlap around the Dome of the Rock, in what the Israelis call Temple Mount. To the Arabs and the Muslims in general, the Mosque of Omar and the Dome of the Rock are the third holiest site of Islam. They have been under Muslim ownership and domination since the days of the Caliph Omar Ibn Al-Khattab; even the British mandate over Palestine recognised this area legally as Palestinian in ownership.
Ironically, certain trends in Judaism claim that the Muslim sanctuary is built on the very site where the Temple of Solomon once stood. Many Jews believe that they are entitled to this site, where they want to rebuild "The Temple" -- seen as the house of God, which was destroyed because the Jews strayed from the path their religion dictated. Some fundamentalist groups advocate the destruction of Al-Aqsa Mosque, while mainstream theologians argue that the rebuilding of the Temple is an act to be undertaken by God. They agree, however, that the site must be under Jewish control.
The 1967 defeat, at any rate, placed the whole area under Israeli military domination. The question today is how claims and counterclaims can be settled in a permanent peace context. To complicate the matter, UN Resolution 242, which calls on Israel to withdraw from the areas occupied in 1967, does not specify what to do with Jerusalem. In 1967, there was no Palestinian state; that part of Jerusalem which was occupied was part of the Kingdom of Jordan. The many faces of Jerusalem include the walled city, and the rest of what was called East Jerusalem under Jordanian rule. It also includes the part called West Jerusalem, under Israeli rule. Since 1967, the Israelis have attempted to "unify" Jerusalem, as they describe their policy -- which consists essentially of adding new villages and building new settlements in a bid to change the status quo and create a city under exclusive Israeli control. The new Jerusalem as planned by the Israelis could include a fifth to a sixth of the West Bank.
It is in the core of the city, however, that Arab/Muslim and Israeli/Jewish claims clash most powerfully. Here, no solution has been found that is mutually acceptable, or deemed legitimate by both parties.
The framers of the UN partition plan for Palestine, as embodied in UN Resolution 181 of November 1947, decided that the city of Jerusalem would be established as a corpus separatum under the authority of a special international regime, and would be administered by the UN. A referendum was to be held after 10 years.
Efforts to negotiate a mutually acceptable solution to Jerusalem never ceased. Recently, a group of international academics and activists met to suggest that the following principles guide the settlement of the Jerusalem issue:
(1) Neither the annexation nor the partition of Jerusalem should serve as the basis for the final status of the city. Jerusalem is to be the capital of both Israel and Palestine, with Jewish Western and Arab Eastern parts of the city, on equal footing.
(2) Palestinians and Israelis shall be sovereign over their respective capitals.
(3) The unique importance of the walled city to both sides implies special arrangements, to be negotiated by the parties.
(4) The holiness of Jerusalem should be upheld, with free access to Israelis and Palestinians alike.
(5) Governance of the city must respect the importance of Jerusalem's pluralistic and multicultural character. The preservation of the religious interests of Christians, Jews and Muslims must be guaranteed; freedom of worship and access to the holy places must be assured.
(6) The status quo in administration of the holy places should be maintained and mechanisms for coordination among the religious authorities should be introduced.
(7) Principles of self-governance of all communities and at all levels should be equitable and democratic.
The last time Israel's chief rabbinate addressed the status of the Temple Mount was after the 1967 War. At that time, the rabbis agreed that the site should be administered by the Palestinians as part of the status quo arrangement that preceded the signing of any agreement.
Sephardic Chief Rabbi Eliahu Bakshi-Doron was therefore perfectly consistent when he declared recently that, for "the good of peace," Temple Mount should remain under Palestinian administration even after the permanent settlement is signed (New York Times, 28 June).
The rumours that hovered over Camp David led to a proposal that a Palestinian flag be hoisted over Al-Aqsa Mosque, and that Yasser Arafat be called the "servant of the holy sanctuary," like the king of Saudi Arabia, one of whose titles is servant of the two sanctuaries. The real stumbling block, however, was sovereignty over the underground area, a point on which the Israelis seem to have been utterly intransigent.
There remains the question of what to do now, prior to the declaration of a Palestinian state.
This problem could be solved through joint sovereignty, and a return to the corpus separatum idea. There would be negotiations to set up a workable system and to provide for review -- provided no side takes unilateral measures to change the situation on the ground.
The second possibility is to grant municipal rights to the Arab districts in the walled city and East Jerusalem, and hold separate negotiations between Jewish, Christian and Muslim representatives to create a charter based on equality. This would safeguard the city's pluralism, and allow time to negotiate complex issues. This proposal is simply for an agreement on procedures and guarantees.
The third scenario is a "Palestinian Vatican" in the walled city and East Jerusalem. The rest of Jerusalem would be Israel's capital, as Rome is the capital of Italy.
Jerusalem is the thorn in the negotiators' side, and also the main obstacle to reconciliation among Israelis and Palestinians, Jews, Muslims and Christians. Its symbolic and spiritual significance mean it could destroy any chance of peace -- or make a genuine peace entirely possible.
*The writer is a veteran Egyptian diplomat.
