"Australia reverses recognition of West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital” || SCMP

Jerusalem: capital of Israel. But not to Canberra

There’s nothing to gain by wading into the Israel-Palestine question. Everyone has their view and it’s this or it’s that and that’s the whole of it. I’m a Goy Zionist, so my sympathies are easy to discern. 

I have just one question about this change of tack by my country Oz: what is the advantage in the change? That it helps Palestinians in Australia feel better about themselves, and about Australia, their chosen land of refuge? Or that it helps Indonesia look at us more kindly, as the recognition of Jerusalem had got in the way of our free trade deals?

But Palestinians have rejected every one of the 27 peace proposals in the last 75 years. And Indonesia? Why ought we not be pushing them to follow the Gulf States and recognise Israel, instead  of moaning about our recognition of Jerusalem as actual capital of Israel? But who instead follow the Palestinians, who don’t for one minute want a “two states solution”? The Abraham Accords were a significant breakthrough, the most significant since 1947. And we ought to be pushing it -- like with Indonesia! -- together with our ally, Israel. Not slapping Israel in the face. 

Imagine if we told China that we didn’t recognise Beijing as their capital, but would make our embassy in Nanjing. Or closer to home, if we told New Zealand we preferred to have our embassy in Auckland, not Wellington. How would that go? Yet, uniquely, in Israel, we take it on ourselves, because of the pressure from Palestinian terrorist organisations, to say the capital is Tel Aviv, not Jerusalem. Weird. I don’t know anywhere else that happens. 

The only ones celebrating this latest Aussie move are the PLO. The terrorist organisation. The one once led by the rubber-lipped Yasser Arafat, of whom it was said “Arafat never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity”. But the reason he did was because he was not backed by Palestinians. They didn’t -- and don’t to this day -- really want a two state solution. They want one state: “From the River to the Sea”, that’s to say, to eradicate Israel. To carry out a new holocaust on all the jews, who represent a population that has been in the region for 4,000 years. 

Oh dear. 

Australia reverses recognition of West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital