Fayyad Proclaims Jerusalem
Capital of Palestine
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by Maayana Miskin
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(IsraelNN.com)
Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad proclaimed historic Jerusalem an Arab capital
city in a speech given Saturday near Ramallah. Control of the city must be
granted to a future PA state, he said.
"The
future of the national project and the future of a comprehensive peace in the
region are both dependent on protecting Jerusalem,
its status, its history, and Palestinian rights in the city,” he declared.
"East Jerusalem is the capital of the Palestinian
statehood and the state's sovereignty over its capital must be complete,” he
added.
Similar
statements were made by senior PA negotiator Saeb Erekat, who expressed fury
Sunday over the implementation of a court order evicting two Arab families from
Jewish-owned homes in Jerusalem
where they had been squatting illegally for several years.
"East Jerusalem is, and always will be, Palestinian,” an
angry Erekat said. Like Fayyad, he threatened that Israel's
presence in the entire city of Jerusalem
“threaten[s] the viability of a two-state solution.”
Erekat called
on the international community to reject Jewish growth in historic Jerusalem, which he
termed “a dangerous plan” to thwart Arab demands. “The international community
must act decisively, in line with international law, against these Israeli
measures... Nobody can say that they didn't see these outrageous actions
coming,” he said.
PA leaders have
repeatedly insisted that they be granted sovereignty over all areas of Jerusalem that were conquered by Jordan in 1948 and occupied until 1967, when Israel regained
control over the eastern part of the city during the Six Day War.
Areas demanded
by the PA included the Old City and the Temple Mount,
historic Jewish neighborhoods such as Mei Shiloach (Silwan) and Shimon
HaTzaddik (Sheikh Jarrah), as well as more recently-built neighborhoods
such as Pisgat Ze'ev and Neve Yaakov that are home to a total of roughly
300,000 Israeli Jews.
The PA's
demands have recently met with understanding in the United
States, whose officials have begun pressuring Israel to halt building
projects in some parts of the capital city. While Israeli leaders have
publicly refused to do so, and have said that Jerusalem
will remain Israel's
undivided capital, recent reports suggest that Prime Minister Binyamin
Netanyahu may have given in to American demands and ordered a partial building
freeze.
European Union
countries have been sympathetic to PA demands as well, and several have provided funding
for Israeli-based organizations such as Peace Now, B'Tselem and Ir Amim,
which oppose the Jewish presence in historic Jerusalem.
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IsraelNN Syndications.