Australia reverses recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital

 Australia reverses recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital

Foreign Minister Penny Wong says government ‘regrets’ decision made by previous administration and reiterates commitment to two-state solution.

Australia reverses recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital

Foreign Minister Penny Wong says government ‘regrets’ decision made by previous administration and reiterates commitment to two-state solution.

Australia says the status of Jerusalem should be resolved in peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian people.

Published On 18 Oct 202218 Oct 2022

Australia says it will no longer recognise West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, reversing a decision taken by the government of former Prime Minister Scott Morrison in 2018.

“Today the Government has reaffirmed Australia’s previous and longstanding position that Jerusalem is a final status issue that should be resolved as part of any peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian people,” Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in a statement.

“This reverses the Morrison Government’s recognition of West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.”

Wong reiterated that Australia’s embassy would remain in Tel Aviv and that Canberra was committed to a two-state solution “in which Israel and a future Palestinian state coexist, in peace and security, within internationally recognised borders”.

She added: “We will not support an approach that undermines this prospect.”

The status of Jerusalem is one of the biggest sticking points in attempts to reach a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians

Israel regards the entire city, including the eastern sector it annexed after the 1967 Middle East war, as its capital while Palestinian officials, with broad international backing, want occupied East Jerusalem as the capital of a future state they hope to establish in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

macy,” the Palestinian Authority’s civil affairs minister, Hussein al-Sheikh, said on Twitter.

Sheikh hailed Australia’s “affirmation that the future of sovereignty over Jerusalem depends on the permanent solution based on international legitimacy”.

Shahram Akbarzadeh from Deakin University said that the Australia’s move will revive the international consensus on the status of Jerusalem.

“Australia was diverging from that consensus but now it’s coming back to it.

“It will definitely bring the issue, the Palestinian-Israeli dispute and the future of a two-state solution into spotlight,” he told Al Jazeera from Melbourne, adding that the international community has a big responsibility to address this long-standing problem.

“There is an international consensus that the status of Jerusalem should be handled, decided as part of a larger negotiation on the future of the two states within Israel and Palestine. They cannot be divorced from that matter.”

Al Jazeera’s Bernard Smith reporting from West Jerusalem said that while “little changes” with Wong’s announcement, it was nevertheless symbolic.

“Most countries recognise that the status the final status of Jerusalem is to be determined in talks on Palestinian statehood and Palestinians want East Jerusalem as their capital,” he added.

Israel summons Australian envoy

Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid on Tuesday sharply criticised Australia’s decision.

Lapid described the move as a “hasty response”, adding: “We can only hope that the Australian government manages other matters more seriously and professionally.

“Jerusalem is the eternal and united capital of Israel and nothing will ever change that,” the prime minister also said in a statement released by his office.

The Israeli foreign ministry said it had summoned the Australian ambassador to lodge a formal protest.

Former Australian Prime Minister Morrison announced his conservative government would recognise West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital after the United States went back on decades of policy by recognising the city and moving the US embassy there from Tel Aviv.

The Australian decision was widely criticised by pro-Palestinian groups as well as by the Labor party, which was then in opposition and promised to reverse the move if it was elected.

Zechariah 12 verses 8 to 9

[8]In that day shall the LORD defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and he that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David; and the house of David shall be as God, as the angel of the LORD before them.

[9]And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

Isaiah 62:1-8

[1]For Zion's sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, until the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth.

[2]And the Gentiles shall see thy righteousness, and all kings thy glory: and thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the LORD shall name.

[3]Thou shalt also be a crown of glory in the hand of the LORD, and a royal diadem in the hand of thy God.

[4]Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate: but thou shalt be called Hephzibah, and thy land Beulah: for the LORD delighteth in thee, and thy land shall be married.

[5]For as a young man marrieth a virgin, so shall thy sons marry thee: and as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee.

[6]I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their peace day nor night: ye that make mention of the LORD, keep not silence,

[7]And give him no rest, till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth.

[8]The LORD hath sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his strength, Surely I will no more give thy corn to be meat for thine enemies; and the sons of the stranger shall not drink thy wine, for the which thou hast laboured:

LAPID TO MAKE HISTORY, ANNOUNCE ISRAELI SUPPORT FOR PALESTINIAN STATE AT UN

 Ahead of elections, Yael Lapid Prime Minister of Israel  tells Arabic-language news channels that Jews won’t have freedom to worship on the Temple Mount.

In a last-minute push to appeal to Arab voters ahead of Israel’s national election, Prime Minister Yair Lapid pledged that he would not permit Jewish freedom of worship on the Temple Mount. He also said he would push to amend the Nation-State Law.

The caretaker Prime Minister, whose center-left Yesh Atid party will likely be the second largest political movement in the next Knesset, granted two interviews with Arabic-language outlets and made a number of promises to the community.

“Regarding Al-Aqsa [Mosque], I have made it [clear] in every possible way. We are not changing the status quo at Al-Aqsa, and we will [ensure] the freedom of worship of Muslims at Al-Aqsa,” Lapid told the two

Arabic language news channels.

“During Ramadan, I don’t know, a million people came to pray at Al-Aqsa, and we made sure that they were able to go up and pray, because it is our duty as a government to allow freedom of worship for any Muslim who wants to come and pray at Al-Aqsa and we will protect it.”

But Lapid made it clear that despite the Temple Mount being the holiest site in Judaism, Jews do not have the same rights

that Muslims do to pray at the compound.

“We allow Jewish visits. But we do not allow Jewish prayers on the Temple Mount,” he said.

“It is under supervision, so that the status quo is not violated. The status quo is not violated,” he stressed.

The Temple Mount, where the First and Second Temples were built, is the holiest site in Judaism. The delicate status quo governing the Temple Mount goes

back to 1967, when Israel liberated the the Old City of Jerusalem from Jordan during the Six Day War.

Under the terms of a status quo reached between Israel and the Islamic Waqf, while Jews and Christians are allowed to visit the Temple Mount, only Muslims are allowed to pray there. The status quo also allows the Waqf to administer the Temple Mount while Israel is responsible for security.

Jordan’s special relationship with the Temple Mount and the Waqf was further enshrined in the Israel-Jordan peace treaty of 1994.

Jews who pray, chant, or sing on the Temple Mount are arrested by Israeli police. But in recent years, advocates have questioned this policy and pushed for Jewish prayer rights at the compound.

The idea has also grown

among the Israeli public, with a May 2022 poll finding that slightly more than half of Israelis support Jewish prayer at the Temple Mount. Notably, ultra-Orthodox or Haredi Israelis were the only population group in Israel opposed to prayer at the site due to religious constraints regarding laws of ritual purity, with 86.5% against the practice.

A record number of Jews visited the Temple Mount in 2022. While Jewish prayer is still officially banned at the site, there has been less enforcement from police.

Israeli government officials have also publicly questioned the status quo, with Education Minister Yifat Shasha-Biton pushing for Jewish students to participate in field trips to the site, and former Yamina MK Yomtob Kalfon questioning the restrictions on Jewish prayer at the Temple Mount.

In additional comments to the Arabic language outlet, Lapid added that he opposes the Nation-State Law, a 2018 measure which officially declared Israel to be the state of the Jewish people.

“I think it should be changed and a section of civil equality added to it. There were talks about this, that a section be added to the basic law: human dignity and freedom,” Lapid said.

“At the time I was strongly opposed to the Nation-State Law and in the Knesset plenum I said ‘the State will not humiliate its citizens.’ The Nation-State Law as it is written today is an insult to non-Jewish Israeli citizens and must be amended.”

TEMPLE MOUNT ADDRESS

TOM NISANI OF TEMPLE MOUNT HERITAGE FOUNDATION¦ HIS FIRST HAND REPORT ON CURRENT AND ON GOING CONFLICT ON THE TEMPLE MOUNT. 

 Temple Mount, Jerusalem, Temple Mount Heritage FoundationLanguage English Can we be allowed on the Temple Mount Watch as Tom Nisani CEO, Founder and Director of the Temple Mount Herritage Foundation in his interview provide first hand information on the Current and ongoing conflict on the #TempleMount.  Question is 1. Are #Jews allowed freely onto the Temple Mount? 2. Does #Christians allowed freely onto the #TempleMount? 3. Does #Tourist  allowed freely onto the Temple Mount area? 4. Does #Israeli Government support Temple Mount projects? 5. What's the current role we as Nations going to play.  Here from Tom Nisani Director, Founder and CEO of TMHF.  TOM NISANI OF TEMPLE MOUNT HERITAGE FOUNDATION¦ HIS FIRST HAND REPORT ON CURRENT AND ON GOING CONFLICT ON THE TEMPLE MOUNT. 

 The present site is a flat plaza surrounded by retaining walls (including the Western Wall) that was built during the reign of Herod the Great for an expansion of the temple. The plaza is dominated by three monumental structures from the early Umayyad period – the al-Aqsa Mosque, the Dome of the Rock and the Dome of the Chain – and four minarets. Herodian walls and gates, with additions from the late Byzantine and early Islamic periods, cut through the flanks of the Mount. Currently, it can be reached through eleven gates, ten reserved for Muslims and one for non-Muslims, with guard posts of Israeli police in the vicinity of each. According to Jewish tradition and scripture, the First Temple was built by King Solomon, the son of King David, in 957 BCE, and was destroyed by the Neo-Babylonian Empire in 586 BCE; however, no substantial archaeological evidence has verified this. The Second Temple was constructed under the auspices of Zerubbabel in 516 BCE, and was destroyed by the Roman Empire in 70 CE. Orthodox Jewish tradition maintains it is here that the third and final Temple will be built when the Messiah comes.

 The location is the holiest site in Judaism, and is the place Jews turn towards during prayer. Due to its extreme sanctity, many Jews will not walk on the Mount itself, to avoid unintentionally entering the area where the Holy of Holies stood, since according to rabbinical law, there is still some aspect of the divine presence at the site. Among Muslims, the Mount is the site of one of the three Sacred Mosques, the holiest sites in Islam. Amongst Sunni Muslims, it is considered the third holiest site in Islam. Revered as the Noble Sanctuary, the location of Muhammad's journey to Jerusalem and ascension to heaven, the site is also associated with the Jewish biblical prophets who are also venerated in Islam. Umayyad Caliphs commissioned the construction of the al-Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock on the site. The Dome was completed in 692 CE, making it one of the oldest extant Islamic structures in the world. The Al Aqsa Mosque rests on the far southern side of the Mount, facing Mecca. The Dome of the Rock

currently sits in the middle, occupying or close to the area where the Holy Temple previously stood. In light of the dual claims of Judaism and Islam, it is one of the most contested religious sites in the world. Since the Crusades, the Muslim community of Jerusalem has managed the site through the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf. 

The Temple Mount is within the Old City, which has been controlled by Israel since 1967. After the Six-Day War, Israel handed administration of the site back to the Waqf under Jordanian custodianship, while maintaining Israeli security control. It remains a major focal point of the Arab–Israeli conflict. In an attempt to keep the status quo, the Israeli government enforces a controversial ban on prayer by non-Muslims. Terminology The concept of the "Temple Mount" gained prominence in the first century CE, after the destruction of the Second Temple. 

Although the term "Temple Mount" was first used in the Book of Micah (4:1) – literally as "Mount of the House" – it was not used again until approximately one thousand years later. The term was not used in the New Testament. The term was used next in the Talmud's Tractate Middot (1:1–3, 2:1–2), in which the area was described in detail.The term was used frequently in Talmudic texts thereafter. Location and dimensions Topographical map of Jerusalem, showing the Temple Mount on the eastern peak. 

The Holyland Model of Jerusalem, an imagined reconstruction of the city in the late Second Temple period, showing the large flat expanse on the Temple Mount as a base for Herod's Temple, in the center. View from the east. The Temple Mount forms the northern portion of a very narrow spur of hill that slopes sharply downward from north to south. 

Rising above the Kidron Valley to the east and Tyropoeon Valley to the west,its peak reaches a height of 740 m (2,428 ft) above sea level. In around 19 BCE, Herod the Great extended the Mount's natural plateau by enclosing the area with four massive retaining walls and filling the voids. 

This artificial expansion resulted in a large flat expanse which today forms the eastern section of the Old City of Jerusalem. The trapezium shaped platform measures 488 m along the west, 470 m along the east, 315 m along the north and 280 m along the south, giving a total area of approximately 150,000 m2 (37 acres).The northern wall of the Mount, together with the northern section of the western wall, is hidden behind residential buildings. 

The southern section of the western flank is revealed and contains what is known as the Western Wall. The retaining walls on these two sides descend many meters below ground level. A northern portion of the western wall may be seen from within the Western Wall Tunnel, which was excavated through buildings adjacent to the platform. On the southern and eastern sides the walls are visible almost to their full height. The platform itself is separated from the rest of the Old City by the Tyropoeon Valley, though this once deep valley is now largely hidden beneath later deposits, and is imperceptible in places. The platform can be reached via Gate of the Chain Street – a street in the Muslim Quarter at the level of the platform, actually sitting on a monumental bridge; better source needed] the bridge is no longer externally visible due to the change in ground level, but it can be seen from beneath via the Western Wall Tunnel.[citation needed] Religious significance See also: Religious significance of Jerusalem The Temple Mount has historical and religious significance for all three of the major Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

 It has particular religious significance for Judaism and Islam, and the competing claims of these faith communities has made it one of the most contested religious sites in the world. Wall of the Temple Mount (southeast corner) Judaism See also: Temple in Jerusalem The Temple Mount is the holiest site in Judaism, which regards it as the place where God's divine presence is manifested more than in any other place, and is the place Jews turn towards during prayer. Due to its extreme sanctity, many Jews will not walk on the Mount itself, to avoid unintentionally entering the area where the Holy of Holies stood, since according to Rabbinical law, some aspect of the divine presence is still present at the site.It was from the Holy of Holies that the High Priest communicated directly with God. According to the rabbinic sages whose debates produced the Talmud, it was from here the world expanded into its present form and where God gathered the dust used to create the first human, Adam. 2Chronicles  3:1  refers to the Temple Mount in the time before the construction of the temple as Mount Moriah (Hebrew: הַר הַמֹּורִיָּה‎, har ha-Môriyyāh). The "land of Moriah" (Hebrew: אֶרֶץ הַמֹּרִיָּה‎, ʾeretṣ ha-Môriyyāh) is the name given by Genesis to the location of Abraham's binding of Isaac.

Since at least the first century CE, the two sites have been identified with one another in Judaism, this identification being subsequently perpetuated by Jewish and Christian tradition. Modern scholarship tends to regard them as distinct (see Moriah). Presumed to be The Foundation Stone, or a large part of it Jewish connection and veneration to the site arguably stems from the fact that it contains the Foundation Stone which, according to the rabbis of the Talmud, was the spot from where the world was created and expanded into its current form. It was subsequently the Holy of Holies of the Temple, the Most Holy Place in Judaism. Jewish tradition names it as the location for a number of important events which occurred in the Bible, including the Binding of Isaac, Jacob's dream, and the prayer of Isaac and Rebekah. Similarly, when the Bible recounts that King David purchased a threshing floor owned by Araunah the Jebusite, tradition locates it as being on this mount. 

An early Jewish text, the Genesis Rabba, states that this site is one of three about which the nations of the world cannot taunt Israel and say "you have stolen them," since it was purchased "for its full price" by David. According to the Bible, David wanted to construct a sanctuary there, but this was left to his son Solomon, who completed the task in c. 950 BCE with the construction of the First Temple. According to Jewish tradition, both Jewish Temples stood at the Temple Mount, though archaeological evidence only exists for the Second Temple. However, the identification of Solomon's Temple with the area of the Temple Mount is widespread. According to the Bible the site should function as the center of all national life—a governmental, judicial and religious center. During the Second Temple period it functioned also as an economic center. According to Jewish tradition and scripture, the First Temple was built by King Solomon the son of King David in 957 BCE and destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. The second was constructed under the auspices of Zerubbabel in 516 BCE and destroyed by the Roman Empire in 70 CE. In the 2nd century, the site was used for a temple to Jupiter Capitolinus. 

It was redeveloped following the Arab conquest. Jewish texts predict that the Mount will be the site of a Third and final Temple, which will be rebuilt with the coming of the Jewish Messiah. 

A number of vocal Jewish groups now advocate building the Third Holy Temple without delay in order to bring to pass God's "end-time prophetic plans for Israel and the entire world." Several passages in the Hebrew Bible indicate that during the time when they were written, the Temple Mount was identified as Mount Zion. 

The Mount Zion mentioned in the later parts of the Book of Isaiah (Isaiah 60:14), in the Book of Psalms, and the First Book of Maccabees (c. 2nd century BCE) seems to refer to the top of the hill, generally known as the Temple Mount. According to the Book of Samuel, Mount Zion was the site of the Jebusite fortress called the "stronghold of Zion", but once the First Temple was erected, according to the Bible, at the top of the Eastern Hill ("Temple Mount"), the name "Mount Zion" migrated there too. 

The name later migrated for a last time, this time to Jerusalem's Western Hill. In 1217, Spanish Rabbi Judah al-Harizi found the sight of the Muslim structures on the mount profoundly disturbing. "What torment to see our holy courts converted into an alien temple!" he wrote. Christianity See also: Jerusalem in Christianity The Temple was of central importance in Jewish worship in the Tanakh (Old Testament). In the New Testament, Herod's Temple was the site of several events in the life of Jesus, and Christian loyalty to the site as a focal point remained long after his death.After the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, which came to be regarded by early Christians, as it was by Josephus and the sages of the Jerusalem Talmud, to be a divine act of punishment for the sins of the Jewish people, the Temple Mount lost its significance for Christian worship with the Christians considering it a fulfillment of Christ's prophecy at, for example, Matthew 23:28 and 24:2. It was to this end, proof of a biblical prophecy fulfilled and of Christianity's victory over Judaism with the New Covenant, that early Christian pilgrims also visited the site. 

Byzantine Christians, despite some signs of constructive work on the esplanade, generally neglected the Temple Mount, especially when a Jewish attempt to rebuild the Temple was destroyed by the earthquake in 363. It became a desolate local rubbish dump, perhaps outside the city limits,[50] as Christian worship in Jerusalem shifted to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and Jerusalem's centrality was replaced by Rome. During the Byzantine era, Jerusalem was primarily Christian and pilgrims came by the tens of thousands to experience the places where Jesus walked.[citation needed] After the Persian invasion in 614 many churches were razed and the site was turned into a dumpyard. The Arabs conquered the city from the Byzantine Empire which had retaken it in 629. 

The Byzantine ban on the Jews was lifted and they were allowed to live inside the city and visit the places of worship. Christian pilgrims were able to come and experience the Temple Mount area.[52] The war between Seljuqs and Byzantine Empire and increasing Muslim violence against Christian pilgrims to Jerusalem instigated the Crusades. The Crusaders captured Jerusalem in 1099 and the Dome of the Rock was given to the Augustinians, who turned it into a church, and the Al-Aqsa Mosque became the royal palace of Baldwin I of Jerusalem in 1104. The Knights Templar, who believed the Dome of the Rock was the site of the Solomon's Temple, gave it the name "Templum Domini" and set up their headquarters in the Al-Aqsa Mosque adjacent to the Dome for much of the 12th century.[citation needed] In Christian art, the circumcision of Jesus was conventionally depicted as taking place at the Temple, even though European artists until recently had no way of knowing what the Temple looked like and the Gospels do not state that the event took place at the Temple.