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Listen to PM Scott Mor­ris­on’s historic speech declaring that Australia recog­nises Jerusalem as Israel’s capital here:

Australia recog­nises that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel

15 December 2018

The Executive Council of Aus­trali­an Jewry (ECAJ), the peak rep­res­ent­at­ive body of the Aus­trali­an Jewish community, has welcomed the Aus­trali­an government’s ground-breaking announce­ment that “Australia now recog­nises West Jerusalem, as the seat of the Knesset and many of the insti­tu­tions of gov­ern­ment, is the capital of Israel.” Prime Minister Scott Morrison made the announce­ment at a speech at the Sydney Institute today.

In a joint statement made by ECAJ President Anton Block and CEOs, Peter Wertheim and Alex Ryvchin, the ECAJ praised the announce­ment as “a simple acknow­ledge­ment of a reality that has existed since 1950. The Prime Minister deserves credit for resisting pressure from many quarters against taking even this modest step”.

“Recog­nising that Israel’s seat of gov­ern­ment is located in the western part of the city, which is incon­test­ably sovereign Israeli territory, does not in any way impact upon or pre-judge the future status of the contested eastern and other parts of the city captured by Israel in 1967”, they said.

“The Prime Minister noted that Jerusalem’s ultimate status, including its borders and bound­ar­ies, is a final status issue to be resolved between the parties”, they added. “This is a pointed rejection of the Palestini­ans’ demand that their claim to the whole of eastern Jerusalem must be accepted up front, as was the Prime Minister’s statement that Australia expects the capital of a future Palestini­an state to be located ‘in’ east Jerusalem. This leaves open the pos­sib­il­ity that the pre­dom­in­antly Jewish neigh­bour­hoods located in east Jerusalem can become a part of Israel in any nego­ti­ated set­tle­ment”.

“Australia is a respected regional power which has good relations with both Israel and the Palestini­ans”, the ECAJ spokespeople said. “The Aus­trali­an government’s announce­ment sends a message to Palestini­an leaders that their uni­lat­er­al­ist approach, seeking to prise con­ces­sions out of Israel without any quid pro quo, through the UN and its agencies and via the BDS campaign, is rejected by reas­on­able people, and has had the opposite results to those the Palestini­ans had intended. It’s a failed strategy, and the Palestini­ans need to return to the nego­ti­at­ing table. There is no other way to achieve a 2

Palestini­an State that will be viable, and a just and lasting peace based on the principle of two States for two peoples”.

The ECAJ noted that the Aus­trali­an gov­ern­ment will delay moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem until the final status of the city is determ­ined under a peace agreement, and that in the interim Australia will establish a defence and trade office in Jerusalem.

“We hope that this will be a first step only”, the ECAJ spokespeople said. ““We look forward to Australia moving its embassy in Israel to the gov­ern­ment precinct in the western part of Jerusalem in due course. Moving Australia’s embassy there would be no more pre-emptive of the outcome of peace nego­ti­ations than recog­nising it as Israel’s capital”.

The ECAJ also welcomed the Prime Minister’s criticism of the “biased and unfair targeting of Israel” in the UN General Assembly, which he described as “deeply unhelpful to efforts to build peace and stability”, and his obser­va­tion that “the UN General Assembly is now the place where Israel is bullied and where antisemitism is cloaked in language about human rights.”

The ECAJ spokespeople stated: “Nothing is more corrosive of the inter­na­tion­al rules-based order than this kind of bias and implicit racism within the UN’s culture. The Prime Minister’s cri­ti­cisms of the UN are well-founded, and Australia’s recent rejection of biased res­ol­u­tions against Israel is to be applauded”.

The ECAJ agreed with the Prime Minister’s obser­va­tion that the Iran nuclear deal was not designed to address Iran’s destabil­ising activ­it­ies in the Middle East region and beyond, its spon­sor­ship of terrorism or its pro­lif­er­a­tion of ballistic missiles. “These are precisely the reasons why the deal should be reviewed, not affirmed”, the ECAJ spokespeople said. “We hope that the Aus­trali­an gov­ern­ment will come to the same con­clu­sion in time, but in the meantime we appre­ci­ate the measures taken by the gov­ern­ment to constrain the Iranian regime’s aggress­ive and destabil­ising actions”.

Contact
Peter Wertheim AM | co-CEO
ph: 02 8353 8500 | m: 0408 160 904 | fax 02 9361 5888
e: [email protected] | www.ecaj.org.au