Jerusalem is part of the Deal of the Century

T. Belman. I am flabergasted. This sounds very credible. Yet for the last year, Mudar has insisted that its all BS and that Israel will be the sovereign to the River.

I JUST TALKED WITH MUDAR AND HE ASSURES ME THAT ISRAEL WILL BE SOVEREIGN TO THE RIVER.

By Nadav Shragai, ISRAEL HAYOM    March 7th 2019

(Translated to English by Sally Zahav for the Sovereignty Movement)

The re-division of the city and transfer of Arab neighborhoods to Palestinian sovereignty • Maintaining Israeli sovereignty over most of the part that was “Jordanian Jerusalem” before ’67, including the Old City • Including more parties in the management of the Temple Mount

Scoop: parts of Trump’s “Deal of the Century” relating to Jerusalem as they were presented to the sides.

Right after the elections, the U.S. plans to place the Deal of the Century on the agenda, and the part on Jerusalem is central. It is intended to force all of the players on the Israeli side to relate to the plan even during negotiations to form a coalition for the new government. Certain parts and ideas of the plan have already been presented to Israel and the Palestinians as well as to Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt, and we publish here for the first time, the outlines (not necessarily in their final form) relating to Jerusalem, as it was presented to the various sides.

The Trump plan effectively divides Jerusalem and changes its borders.  It removes the northern parts of Kfar Aqab and the Shuafat refugee camp beyond the fence from  the city’s territorial municipality, where Israeli law was applied in 1967, and transfers them to the territory of the Palestinian state, which, according to the plan, will cover 85 percent of the territories of Judea and Samaria. Also Arab neighborhoods in the southern part of the city, such as Jabal Mukabar and Arab a-Suahera, Umm Lison and Umm Tuba, and possibly even Tsur Baher (which adjoin the Jewish neighborhoods of East Talpiot and Har Homa ) will be transferred, according to the plan, to Palestinian sovereignty. At least for the first phase, the plan leaves in Israel’s hands broad security responsibility for the territories that will be removed from Jerusalem.

The Americans make a distinction in principle between, on the one hand, the prior Jordanian area of Jerusalem, in the lines before 1967, only about 6 square kilometers, which included part of the Old City and its adjoining neighborhoods, and on the other hand, the additional 64 square kilometers that Israel annexed to Jerusalem after the Six Day War, including another 28 villages which originally were not part of Jerusalem.

According to the Trump plan, in many parts of the more limited area, where both the Old City and the Holy Basin are located, as well as part of Silwan-City of David, the area of the Mount of Olives, the area of Shimon the Tzadik-Wadi Juz-Sheikh Gera, Mount Scopus and apparently even Abu Tor – Israeli sovereignty will remain in place. However, some of the Arab neighborhoods that are located further out will be transferred to Palestinian sovereignty. The twelve Jewish neighborhoods established after 1967 in “lesser” Jerusalem (the Jordanian) and the “extended” areas (the 28 villages) in which more than 220 thousand Jews now live, will remain in Israeli hands and under her sovereignty.

Functional Sovereignty

The Trump plan is more generous to Israel than that of a previous president, Bill Clinton, as well as various other proposals that were discussed during the Annapolis Conference. Clinton wanted Palestinian sovereignty over all the Arab neighborhoods in eastern Jerusalem, including over most of the Old City and around the Old City (except
for the Jewish Quarter and other areas). In the Annapolis Conference (in which the Olmert government took part in 2007-2008) there was talk of establishing a trusteeship of five states for the Old City and the
Holy Basin.

The Trump plan, in contrast, leaves sovereignty over the Old City and the area of the Holy Basin in Israel’s hands, while simultaneously talking about Palestinian participation in this area. The concept being used here is “functional sovereignty”, which grants authorities in various fields, without a “overriding sovereignty”,   which, as stated, would remain in Israeli hands. Functional sovereignty is a concept with a wide range of possibilities, from symbolic
administrative involvement of the Palestinians through communal managers or municipal districts, up to actual administrative autonomy, with oversight and under Israeli sovereignty in areas such as sanitation, green spaces and roads, religion, physical planning, transportation, economy and even municipal administration and policing.

During the term of Mayor Teddy Kollek, obm, various work was done in these fields, not necessarily related to a political solution for the city. Similar plans were drawn up by the Jerusalem Institute for Policy Studies. As far as is known, that material was used as auxiliary material by the American team to help in formulation of their plan.

Palestinian participation in administration of the Old City, even without sovereignty over the area, can be expected to arouse a hot dispute. In the opinion of senior Israeli figures, it would be a plan  for “a messy situation and blurring of lines that could increase pressure, instead of reducing it”. In this area is a religious complex with hundreds of mosques, churches and synagogues in the center of which is the Temple Mount, the Western Wall and the Church of the Sepulcher. Approximately 38 thousand residents live in the Old City under very crowded conditions. About 90% of them are not Jews, mainly Muslims and a few Christians and Armenians, and about 10% are Jews (about 3,000 in the Jewish Quarter and another approximately 1,500, mainly in the Muslim Quarter).

Security before openness

Another weighty problem that was discussed between the Americans and Israel and the Arab and Palestinian parties who have been privy to parts of the Trump plan, is the character of the border and the separation between Israeli Jerusalem and Palestinian Jerusalem, after the new borders have been drawn. The preconceived aspiration of all
parties in the discussions is to leave Jerusalem as an open city; one physical unit without borders, so that the passage between the sections would remain free and open both for Israeli and Palestinians, even after the borders of the city have been redrawn and its sovereignty has been redesigned and divided. However, the Americans understand that for now, there is a difference between the ideal and reality and this is because of difficult security problems that an
open border would pose.

The Military and security levels in Israel have expressed their opinion in previous negotiations, for a solid border that would prevent free passage and which would comprise dozens of crossing points and checkpoints. These would be intended to allow effective inspection and prevention and reduction of terror attacks by radical Palestinians, who oppose today, and can be expected to oppose in the future, any agreement or compromise. In previous discussions the political level was given the professional status, but it is not clear regarding the present plan.

In the discussion with the Americans, the Israeli side presented their doubts that such a plan of division would be accepted in Israeli public opinion, and ideas were raised that could soften the “blow”, such as increasing the area of Israeli Jerusalem in the direction of Ma’ale Adumim and eastward, including allowing the construction of the
planned E-1 neighborhood (the neighborhood connecting Jerusalem and Ma’ale Adumim) as well as broadening the area of Jerusalem southward to the area of Gush Etzion and Beitar (including allowing the construction in Givat Hamatos) and northward in the direction of Givat Ze’ev and Adam.

The third key component of the Trump plan deals with the holy sites in the city. The Wall will remain exclusively in Israeli hands, including what is underground, beneath it, for the length of the Western Wall Tunnel up to its northern edge, as well as the southern part of the Western Wall (the archaeological garden), totaling 488 meters above
and below ground. This component is contrary to the position of the Palestinians, who are willing to leave only about 69 meters of the Wall, which is above the prayer space, in Israeli hands.

Who would actually agree to it?

On the Temple Mount itself the Americans, together with the other parties, examined a change in the framework, in which, along with Jordan, other Arab countries would also be included in joint management, together with Israel, under continued Israeli sovereignty.

Today, only Jordan participates in managing the site, which is a result of the peace agreement with Israel, and official as well as non-official understandings between it and Israel. Therefore, a joint Israeli-Jordanian committee is operational today. It deals mostly with problems that arise on the Temple Mount from time to time, such as the
crisis of the magnetometers in the summer of 2017, and the current crisis at the Gate of Mercy, which the WAKF, in the past two weeks, has turned into a fifth mosque on the Temple Mount.

The key candidates to be integrated into a religious-political-administrative body of this sort that were mentioned in the discussions that the Ame icans held are Saudi Arabia, Morocco and the Palestinians. Jordan virulently objects to this possibility, which might, in the future, harm its present senior status on the Temple Mount among the Muslim bodies, and especially objects to including Saudi Arabia, Jordan’s great rival in the guardianship of the Islamic holy sites, at the Temple Mount, since Saudi Arabia already controls Mecca and Medina.

Another component of the Trump plan was presented for the parties’ perusal is that of “safe passage” – whose legal status has not yet been determined – between Palestinian Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. The Palestinians totally reject Trump’s plan, particularly to its components dealing with Jerusalem. The response of a large part of
Gantz and Lapid’s Blue and White party to the Jerusalem components of the Trump plan – to judge by positions that they have expressed in the past – may be expected to be in favor. Netanyahu’s response to the Jerusalem components in Trump’s plan is not clear. On one hand, this is the most generous plan that an American president have ever proposed to Israel on the issue of Jerusalem, and it includes recognition of Israeli sovereignty in the Old City and its surrounding neighborhoods. On the other hand, it divides Jerusalem – even if they use a more euphemistic term – which is likely to be accompanied by significant security risks. Trump, we must recall, did not hide his expectation for an Israeli “payment” during the past year, for recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and moving the embassy to the capital.

The clash that Bennett initiated with Netanyahu over the Trump plan is, apparently, only the promo for the fiery dispute – over values, ideology and security – that will break out here revolving around the “Deal of the Century” in general and the Jerusalem clauses in particular.