Uh-oh, Israeli mayor to unveil a “Marshall Plan” for Jerusalem
Jerusalem is one of the major “core issues” that is supposed to be dealt with in Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, if they ever get off the ground. Is Israel about to definitively pre-judge the question?
The Israeli Government Press Office has alerted journalists to a major press conference on Wednesday, in which “The Mayor of Jerusalem, Uri Lupolianski, will reveal tomorrow a comprehensive ‘Marshall Plan’ to upgrade the main business center of eastern Jerusalem. In addition, plans for massive building in eastern Jerusalem and for developing the Muslim Quarter in the Old City will be presented. This is the most comprehensive plan concerning the eastern part of the city since the reunification of Jerusalem. The press conference will be held tomorrow, Wednesday, November 21st, 10:00, at the Jerusalem city hall”…
Israel has declared that Jerusalem is its “eternal and undivided” capital. The Palestinians say that East Jerusalem — the part not occupied by Israel in 1948, but then seized by the IDF in June 1967 — will be the capital of the Palestinian State. Recent Israeli talk about giving back some of those areas of East Jerusalem to the Palestinian Authority has been extremely upsetting to Palestinian residents, whose lives may be about to be disrupted yet again. The offer to return some of these areas, however, appears to be motivated more by “demographic” concerns than by any desire to find a real and workable peaceful solution — the idea seems to be to get rid of as many Palestinians as possible…
November 20th, 2007 at 11:36 pm
It will be fair to have all living beings of Jerusalem equip themselves with foreign passports this way if a terrible monsterous event will happen then they have somewhere to go.
If the Israeli think tanks are serious about giving parts of Jerusalem to the PA then why not have East jerusalem residents seek a foreign country to accept them and the land they reside on which Israelis find no harm in loosing it.
November 21st, 2007 at 10:06 am
Well, you’ve definitely grasped the seriousness of the situation — but stateless people, as the Palestinians still are, ususally have a very hard if not impossible time in getting passports from any other country. They usually have a hard time even getting a visa.
There was some talk a couple of weeks ago about Jordan issuing passports to all Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem — and these seemingly casual comments caused a lot of private disturbance.
One problem here is the idea that people can simply be disposed of, told to move on, to go away. I heard a woman (from the U.S.) ask in a book discussion in West Jerusalem recently why the Palestinians just don’t go away, if they know that Israel doesn’t want them. Well, that is simply not acceptable in this modern era.