Published: 13 December 2017
Last updated: 4 March 2024
Their love for Jerusalem is hollow. They have reduced Jerusalem to little more than a humiliated pawn in their political games as they pander to their constituencies.
Their love for Jerusalem is vicious and aggressive. They are jealous lovers who want to own, possess and dominate the city – and, if they can’t, then they are willing to let her die.
They profess love for the city, but they don’t live here and they really don’t know much about our city. Neither Trump’s declaration, nor Netanyahu’s opportunistic response, pay any attention to the real-life issues that Jerusalemites face as we try to live in this sacred, complicated, scarred and charmed city.
Neither Trump’s declaration, nor Netanyahu’s opportunistic response, pay any attention to the real-life issues that Jerusalemites face as we try to live in this sacred, complicated, scarred and charmed city. They offer us no solutions that will enable Jerusalem’s residents to live functional, productive and creative lives here.
They claim to love Jerusalem, but they clearly have no use for Jerusalemites.
I am a Jerusalemite. I live here. I raised my children here, in times of hateful extremism and murderous terror. As a Jewish Israeli, a mother, a progressive Jew, a Zionist, and across all my other identities, living here infuses even mundane daily life with profound meaning, historical connections, and political significance.
Jerusalem must become the capital of two independent states, Israel and Palestine, in order to calm the strong nationalist and religious sentiments of its residents.
Neither Trump nor Netanyahu, or any of the other politicians have ever asked me what I think; out of political expedience, they simply assume that I, as a Jew, will buy into their right-wing jargon about a “united city, unified under Israeli sovereignty forever.”
And when Trump gave recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital to Netanyahu – as if the city were his to give – they didn’t ask the Palestinians, who love this city as I do, what it means to them, either.
The politicians never ask, so I’m going to tell them what I think. Over the years, I have been privileged to be part of a group of Jewish and Palestinian Jerusalemites who truly love this city and seek ways to live here, together.
We have worked together, even when terror and extremism surrounded us, and now I know some things about Jerusalem that Trump, Netanyahu, and all the other (mostly male) politicians should learn, too.
I know that Jerusalem cannot be owned. Throughout recorded history, Jerusalem has been conquered and liberated by peoples who wanted to keep it for themselves. The city can be subjugated and cowered into submission – for a while. But Jerusalem cannot be united by fiat or divided by declaration.
I also know that without inclusivity, human rights, and equality for all, no city can be called united. As long as fully 80% of Palestinian Jerusalemites live in poverty, and as long as Palestinians are disenfranchised, disempowered, discriminated against and oppressed, this city will remain divided.
To love Jerusalem is to recognise that the city must be creatively, and equitably, shared. And that means that it must be both divided and united – that is, it must be politically divided so that it can be geographically and functionally united.
Jerusalem must become the capital of two independent states, Israel and Palestine, in order to calm the strong nationalist and religious sentiments of its residents. East and West Jerusalem should be separate municipalities answering to the needs of their respective constituencies and administered and coordinated by a larger regional structure.
And a joint administration could be created inside the Old City, with international support and supervision.
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It's complicated, but not undo-able, and there are models that we can learn from. A trans-border metropolitan zone exists on the Italian-Slovenian frontier. Basel has suburbs in France and Germany. And cities like Belfast, Sarajevo and Beirut, once icons of conflict, have all been united and subdivided, and they are calm.
I know, too, that Jerusalem doesn’t only belong to Jerusalemites, and has meaning to millions of Jews, Muslims and Christians from around the world. And I believe that, treated compassionately and sensitively, with attention to the ethnic, religious, national and identity needs of those who do live here, Jerusalem can serve as a world city, instilled with holiness, respect, openness, and tolerance.
But Jerusalem will never reach these goals as long as politicians continue to toy with us, treating us as nothing more than a symbol that they can exploit for their unholy reasons.
In the words of Yehuda Amichai, Jerusalem’s poet laureate
Visits of condolence is all we get from them.
They squat at the Holocaust Memorial.
They put on grave faces at the Wailing Wall.
And they laugh behind heavy curtains
In their hotels.
They have their pictures taken
Together with our famous dead
At Rachel’s Tomb and Herzl’s Tomb
And on the top of Ammunition Hill.
They weep over our sweet boys
And lust over our tough girls
And hang up their underwear
To dry quickly
In cool, blue bathrooms.
Once I sat on the steps by agate at David's Tower,
I placed my two heavy baskets at my side. A group of tourists
was standing around their guide and I became their target marker. "You see
that man with the baskets? Just right of his head there's an arch
from the Roman period. Just right of his head." "But he's moving, he's moving!"
I said to myself: redemption will come only if their guide tells them,
"You see that arch from the Roman period? It's not important: but next to it,
left and down a bit, there sits a man who's bought fruit and vegetables for his family."
(Tourists by Yehuda Amichai; translation by Glenda Abramson and Tudor Parfitt)
Photo: Israeli protesters gather outside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s residence in Jerusalem on July 1 (AFP/Thomas Coex)
