Dr. Sari Nuseibeh

On Jerusalem

As we know, Israel came to control Jerusalem in stages. First, in 1948, the western side: mostly the fashionable residential districts (Upper and Lower Baq’a, Katamon, Talbieh Mamilla and Shama’a, And parts of Abu Tor, Musrara and Rehavia); the environs to the west, south-west and north-west (Lifta, Dier Yassin, Ein Karem, El- Malha) and the heart of the modern commercial center. In 1967, the Israelis occupied the Old City with its environs to the north, east and south. Israel’s development of Jerusalem, east and west, did not begin in real earnest until after 1967, As we also know, Israel’s post1967 intensive development programme involved the construction of housing and associated infrastructure in the unilaterally annexed and expanded territory across the Green Line, obviously designed in such a manner as to:

a-    Create an essentially unified metropolitan complex spread indiscriminately across what were once borders, no-man’s land, village and town district lines, as well as territory confiscated for this purpose (about 22.000 dunams).

b-    Ensure that this web of infrastructure extensions would to all intents and purposes encircle and dis-integrate the territorial and demographic spread of the eastern, once entirely Arab-populated part of the city, rendering it a desegregated or scattered collection of habitats or areas, conspicuous primarily for their obvious neglect by the construction improvement programme.

We also all know that while this feverish Jewish construction activity was underway, a similarly feverish policy was applied to deny building permits for the Arab population, which had doubled in size over the 27 year period since 1967. On average, the total sum of housing unit permits made available to the Arab residents of Jerusalem over the entire 27-year period (not much more than 7500), equals the annual rate of such permits made available to Jewish construction. Even so, the major part of the permits given to Arab residents came in the context of the forced evacuation of Arab inhabitants from the Jewish and Moghrabi quarters of the Old City![1].

In demographic terms, the construction efforts equally transformed the landscape; placing over 150.000 Jewish inhabitants across the Green Line, and making the eastern part of the city almost equally divided between its Arab and Jewish residents. As an aside, it should be noted that when this figure is included, Israeli settlers in the Occupied Territories presently number well over a quarter of a million inhabitants, a fact which many observers gloss over.

Israel’s blatantly discriminatory policy stands out so offensively that I do not believe one need waste too much time in trying to prove it. The relatively recent, heart-rending protests of the territorially-strangled In Touba and Beit Sahur residents against the planned extension of Gilo to the east is but an example.

It may seem strange, against the background of this political and human affront, that a Palestinian Jerusalemite whose sensitivities have become so over-politicised, and whose national existence in the city seems threatened, should nonetheless still regard as the saddest part of this onslaught to be the ravishing of the hills, valleys and countryside of the city. Religious design may still posit Jerusalem as the terrestrial gateway to the divine world, for example, through the story of Muhammad’s night journey and ascension, a tradition whose significance seems universally unappreciated. But looking today on Jerusalem’s cement and mortar landscape, as indeed on its human landscape, it is hard not to entertain some doubt on the matter, or, at any rate not to feel saddened by the disappearance of that unique fusion of sunlight and earth texture in which the entire pastoral surroundings basked.

I hope the day will come, after a political settlement has been finalised, when minds will turn to preserving the spiritual distinctness of Jerusalem and its environs. But my mission in this brief presentation is less to mourn the past or the present as it is to provide a few sketches of a possible future. In doing this, I am afraid I shall not go much beyond the ideas I have already sketched in various places.[2]

Briefly, my personal approach to the Jerusalem problem, consists of two elements, one that to the Palestinians do not in general savour, namely, the de facto existence of Israel on the map; and one which the Israelis do not in general savour, namely, that “the goods” of Jerusalem must be equitably shared between Israelis and Palestinians. Without either of these two principles as an ingredient in the co-existence formula to be designed, I fear that residents of the city–as indeed of the country–will most likely discover that theirs is the gateway to hell rather than to celestial bliss. But also, without these two ingredients in any possible compromise formula, I feel it will not be possible to speculate about peace in the first place-one side or the other can simply bring about what they desire by force, if they can; neither principles of reason, nor principles of morality need be brought to bear on the subject.

But if one were to bring those principles of reason and morality to bear, then it becomes obvious that Palestinians and Israelis mush find a formula in which they can equitably share the goods.

In the country at large, as in Jerusalem, two distinct approaches may be considered. Rights may either be divided distributively among individuals, or they may be spliced between collective entities or groups. If one looks at the country as a whole, the distributive approach would imply that each Palestinian and each Israeli would have equal political rights. These would include the right to exist in one’s home in security, the right to be repatriated to one’s home if one is deprived of the first right to be repatriated to one’s home if one is deprived of the first right, and the right to be a full citizen-meaning, to be a participant to the greatest constitutional extent possible in the determination of one’s future, and to be equal in that respect with everyone else who is a citizen of the state. The application of a distributive system like this would obviously mean the establishment of a democratic, bi-national and multi-religious polity, after adjustments are introduced to compensate for those rights-especially repatriation–that cannot be literally applied.

Approached from the opposite end of the spectrum, rights can be divided between the collective entities or groups to which individuals belong, between the Israeli and Palestinian peoples, and thus in the form of two separate states.

The same principle of sovereign parity can be applied to the Jerusalem metropolis, again with the same choice between two approaches. Either the right to sovereignty is divided distributively among Jerusalemites, regardless of citizenship or present residence status. [3]  Or sovereignty can be divided through separation and splicing between two polities, Israel and Palestine. On the first approach, sovereignty will belong to the city and will be exercised primarily by its citizens rather than by their states, through a multi-national and multi-religious government. Special rights and privileges can of course be established for the two respective states, Israel and Palestine, and, to a lesser, or perhaps in a different degree, for other countries in the region and the world. Such rights and privileges, in the case of Israel and Palestine, might indeed include the right to regard the unified city as their respective capital. But to all intents and purposes, the city will enjoy a corpus separatum status conferred upon it by the two states, and confirmed by the international community. Within the borders of this entity (whose exact extension and shape can be mutually determined by the two states wishing to take this approach) special care would have to be given to maintain the religious and ethnic balance of the resident individuals and groups, whether politically, demographically, or developmentally. Given the two national groups already in existence, it may b argued that a more realistic version of this model would in fact be better expressed through the aggregate distributive rights being equitably of equally operated or exercised directly by the two states themselves, in the way two persons or more might share in the operation of a computer programme, rather than indirectly through their respective citizens. But even as the respective states share sovereignty, it is understood on this approach that each would be exercising or operating sovereign rights belonging de primo to the city and its residents, in whom these rights are distributively divested.

Following the second approach, the city’s sovereignty can be spliced de primo between the states, each declaring the part falling within its territorial province to be its capital. The guiding principle in determining a borderline in this case should be the same as that which is deemed operative in the Arab-Israeli talks, namely, the 1948 demarcation line, or the Green line, as it has come to be called. While this Green line can be used as a guiding principle, mutually agreed border adjustments can be envisaged whose purpose is to cater for historical or newly emerged anomalies, and whose underlying philosophy is reciprocity. Indeed, ingenuity might allow future negotiators to regard such a line as being of two kinds, a main continuous line, and a series of secondary, scattered-islands demarcating lines. Additionally, while such a line may be regarded as a borderline demarcating where two territorial limits meet, it need not itself be more than an invisible or “imaginary” line, and the highest degree of porousness across it can be maintained, whether in municipal or in commercial functions.

Observe from what has been said that there is a logical point of departure for any border adjustments (spatial location) or border definitions (functional role) which may be posited in the context of a settlement: in one instance (the first) this logic dictates that each side decide how much of its territory to regard as part of the polis; and the focus of border questions would thus be on the outlying borderline, the overall shape and nature of the city. But in the second instance the focus of border questions (functional and locational) would naturally be on the location and nature of the international border running through the middle of the city, dividing the two separate states. And just as there is such a logical point of departure, there is also a blatant illogically in presuming to address one set of questions if the point of departure does not provide the appropriate basis for it.

The two “theoretic” models outlined can be regarded as extreme versions lying on opposite sides of the same parity spectrum. In outlining them however, I have already hinted at the ways and means that either of them can be worked upon, through the introduction of various adjustments or modules, so that the model as a whole can be made to grow towards the opposite side of the spectrum. Indeed, it might be argued, given the needs and sensitivities associated with Jerusalem, that a “ perfect” model would be one which is to all intents and purposes a mixed version of the two. In this third model, a basic sovereign line may be kept which is porous (or permeable) and invisible enough on the one hand to allow for a maximisation of sharing; but which is substantive enough on the other hand to allow for the required degree of separation. It may be continuous enough to maintain an adherence to the historic green line; but discrete or disjunctive enough to allow for the existence of disjoined or scattered sites of sovereignty. In this way, parity of sovereign rights can be maintained as a basic principle, but the correct mixture of dividing and sharing, separating and integrating will optimise the benefits accruing to the two communities from the implementation of these rights.

It should be noted, in all events, that the nature of such a line will be a function of the nature of the overall borderline between Israel and Palestine, and conversely, for as long as two separate polities continue to exist. Totally porous state-lines, on the other hand, will render any special features in the Jerusalem line redundant.

Translated into practical terms, Palestinian sovereignty over eastern Jerusalem, or Israeli sovereignty over western Jerusalem, can still be mad consistent with an undivided city, and with an extended shared local government, which would operate those sectors-such as sewerage, fire-fighting, street lighting, tourist aid and facilities, forestation or public health–whose enjoyment by the citizen and benefit is non-exclusive- indeed, whose enjoyment and benefit with respect to one citizen is a function of their available benefit and enjoyment for others; and whose operation is not culture-sensitive.

Culture, political and religious-sensitive matters can be operated by two separate municipal governments. Various forms of cooperation can be envisaged, as well as various possibilities of representation and sharing. The city can be the capital of two states and seat of two systems of government, but it can have its own single court of law supervised by a judiciary whose members are seconded respectively by the two states, and whose legal framework, adapted appropriately from the two respective legal systems, is adjusted to address the unique status and dealings of the city’s Israeli and Palestinian residents. Also speaking in practical terms, such a formula would address and balance some otherwise jarring anomalies, such as the presence of a Jewish cemetery lying within Palestinian jurisdiction on the eastern side and a Moslems cemetery lying within Israeli jurisdiction on the western side; or of divided Abu Tor of Sur Bahir; or of a jutting enclave deemed religiously essential to one side of the other.

Indeed, it is not logically, physically, or politically impossible to design a formula that would address “minimal reasonable requirements” on both sides, and any such formula, being as advanced form of this unique mixture of separation and integration, may well serve as an attractive model for the overall relationship between the two states. In any case, it would have to be remembered that, to the extent the separating line is made invisible and economically insignificant, while at the same time maintaining a fairly visible and economically significant line between the two states, the outlying metropolitan borderline endowing the city with a special status will become enhanced.

A major problem which will have to be confronted in this effort is demography; and in particular, the Jewish settlers who have come to reside across the Green Line and within the environs of Jerusalem. I would like to assert here that I do not personally feel comfortable with the notion of legitimising Israel’s de facto transformation of the demographic status quo of the eastern part of the city. Thus neither option-of incorporating such inhabitants into Palestinian sovereign territory, or of annexing such quarters to Israeli sovereign territory-seems to me to be readily palatable. Yet, I have already alluded to the possibility of a at least some adjustments in borders, and it goes without saying that the porousness of the border, allowing for the free movement of capital, goods and people, nationality, and wherever they reside, to move freely. The will in any case make it possible for residents, whatever their basic ingredients for a compromise on this issue, therefore, are obvious, but it would have to be addressed in the same spirit of reciprocity and mutual benefit that all other issues have also to be addressed. I am certain that future negotiations will not be in want of possible suggestions in this area.

Be that as it may- and it may be along while before the two sides finally settle on the most suitable level of mixture and separation –the other aspect to be addressed by both sides will have to be Jerusalem’s universal character.

Jerusalem’s universal (and religious) character can be maintained by declaring the city a violence-free and demilitarized zone, a sanctified area that provides free access to all pilgrims and visitors at all times where properties belonging to foreign churches and their worshippers enjoy total religious immunity, where the rich mosaic of the different religious quarters is enhanced and supported, and where the international community can continue to have a unified symbolic presence and representation through the United Nation, possibly still on Jebel al–Mukabber, by way of indicating the jealousy with which the peace of the city is to be guarded.

It is not beyond the imagination to envisage the introduction of an honourary role for a distinguished international public figure to be appointed as UN representative, perhaps endowing him or her with a special title that would reflect the recognition by the people of Jerusalem of their city’s international character. Beyond that, however, it is difficult for me to see the value now of an internationalization program of the kind envisaged in the UN partition plan.

My final comment has to do with the immense compensating effort which has to be undertaken by all concerned, once a settlement is agreed upon, in order to bring the infrastructure of Palestinian Jerusalem up to the standard enjoyed by Israeli Jerusalem. This will involve a massive programme of renovations in the old city, in the various neighboring Arab quarters, as well as an environment-sensitised development of the commercial centers. Residential construction must also be undertaken, informed again by an environmentally sensitive plan. Many considerations call for such a programme, not least of which the need to create symmetry between the various neighborhoods which would facilitate human harmony in the city. In financial terms, the reconstruction effort cannot be immense by any international standard. But its human and political value will immeasurable.

Still on the human front, I believe that the time must also com and the effort be undertaken to establish a multi-religious higher institute for the study of the region’s civilisations, where scholars from different national and religious backgrounds not only can jointly work on the pluralistic history of Palestine and its civilisations, its peoples and its archeology; but also where a true endeavour can be undertaken to engage in an appreciation of the Abrahamic religion, the source of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

I mention this point here because I believe that Jerusalem’s future peace can only be guaranteed if, in addition to any political or geographic settlement which is worked out, a serious effort is mad in the sphere of historical and religious re-construction. The fact that the three contending religions derive their roots from the same divine message is one, which can either help aggravate an already unhealthy state of dissonance and fiction, or be a source of convergence and harmony.

Especially given the unique way in which Jerusalem is regarded by followers of these religious, both in terms of its role in the past as well an in terms of its status in the future, it is incumbent on the contending parties to purse a course of convergence and harmonisation. This will require a major reappraisal of existing perceptions, and perhaps it calls for a joint reconstruction of the significance of sites and events. After all it is too ironic and sad that the message of a universal truth propagated by a common father should stand in the way of consonance and convergence among those who profess to be his descendants and followers.

I will end by saying that I have, in the final analysis, only presented my personal ruminations on the subject. I hold on to them because of two complementary reasons:

a-    I believe that without them a Jerusalem settlement is not possible; and

b-    I believe that without a Jerusalem settlement a lasting peace in the area is not possible. With them, both a settlement and peace can be made possible