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Showing posts from December, 2016

HAPPY HANUKKAH?: Jerusalem Again in the Spotlight

As Christians prepared for Christmas and Jews for Hanukkah (both were on December 25th this year), the United Nations (UN) Security Council voted on Resolution 2334. Initially it was sponsored by Egypt, who announced a delay after a phone call from President-elect Trump. The next day, 23 December 2016, New Zealand, Malaysia, Senegal and Venezuela jointly sponsored it and it passed 14 to 0 (including permanent members UK, France, China and Russia). The United States abstained. Israel was furious, protesting to all ambassadors of Security Council member nations who have embassies in Tel Aviv . Terminology Two-state solution: An independent (Arab) Palestine and independent Israel living peacefully side-by-side in territory west of the Jordan River. This has been the position of the international community for decades, stretching back to the 1930s and 1940s. Israeli settlements: Settlements are Jewish Israeli communities built on land captured from the Arabs in the Six-D