BYJPOST.COM STAFF
MAY 24, 2017 13:19
In Jerusalem Day address, PM indicates that Israel will never allow the capital to return to its pre-1967 status.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu makes a speech at the Western Wall, February 28, 2015. (photo credit:MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday decisively spoke about Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem and the Jewish people's connection to the capital.
"Over the years, Jerusalem was only our national capital, no one else's," he said, adding that "only under our control did it have freedom of religion."
The premier made the remarks in an address at a special Knesset session to mark Jerusalem Day and the 50th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem after the Six Day War.
Netanyahu indicated that Israel would never allow the capital to return to its pre-1967 status, saying: "The black cloud over Jerusalem disappeared 50 years ago."
"The Temple Mount and Western Wall will stay under Israeli sovereignty forever," he stressed.
The premier also touched on the subject of a so-far elusive regional peace. He said that peace could not be achieved in the region if terror continues to plague the country, referring to the recent wave of terror attacks in Jerusalem's Old City.
He also spoke about Monday night's lethal suicide bombing at a Manchester arena, which claimed the lives of at least 22 and injured scores more during an Ariana Grande concert.
"Had the victims of the Manchester attack been killed in Jerusalem, the terrorist's family would have received a big stipend from the Palestinian Authority," he suggested, explaining to the lawmakers in attendance that the reason Israel has not obtained peace was because of a Palestinian lack of openness for dialogue.
"You cannot say that the despicable act in Manchester is forbidden, but that here in Jerusalem it is allowed," he said in a jab directed at Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, whose Palestine Liberation Organization - which was labeled a terrorist group by Israel and the US until the early 1990s - condemned the terrorist act in Britain.
Netanyahu's remarks came the day after US President Donald Trump concluded his two-day trip to the region as the issue of Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem in general and the Old City specifically has been hotly contested by the international community, which prefers to settle the city’s status within the context of a final-status solution with the Palestinians.
Source: The Jerusalem Post