The Jerusalem disgrace

Government ‘vision’ of divided Jerusalem detached from public sentiment

Ido Netanyahu|Published: 01.15.08 , 00:10

I don’t believe leftists when I hear them talk about dividing Jerusalem. It’s not that I doubt their intention to divide it – they are completely serious on that front. Yet what causes me to raise an eyebrow is the term “painful concessions,” which they often attach to their words on the matter.

Painful for whom? For them? What exactly hurts them and where?

Because to me it doesn’t appear that there is any sadness in their heart when they imagine Marwan Barghouti raising the Palestinian flag above King David’s Citadel. It is certainly not the same kind of sadness that would make them lose sleep should they find out that taxes on jeeps will be tripled tomorrow, or that Glasgow University will be canceling their participation in the next human rights conference.

But the division of Jerusalem hurts them? Don’t make me laugh. A person who loves his wife does not declare that he wants to leave, and if he is completely devoted to her he would not cause her to become the wife of another man.

So what do they feel about Jerusalem? Apparently the same nothingness they have felt in the past four decades, when they declared that “Jerusalem will not be divided again! Bla bla bla.” Back then I didn’t believe them either.

“Five minutes is all it will take,” the young woman on the phone promised me, and as Jerusalem is worth more than five minutes of my time, I agreed to be interviewed for a survey about the city. I just referred to it as a survey, but after the fourth question I already realized we are talking about a means to promote the division of the city on behalf of yet another organization with a beautiful and sterile name such as 'Jerusalem’s Future' or 'A Good Jerusalem.'

“With the exception of the Old City, when did you last visit eastern Jerusalem?” she asked me. “Certainly more often then I visit northern Tel Aviv,” I wanted to reply.

No vision here at all

Can we even imagine a similar survey about Paris, where residents would be asked about the number of times they visited the city’s Muslim sections, as a justification for wresting the heart of the city away from French sovereignty? It would not be difficult to imagine the “compliments” that would be hurled at the pollsters, or the fate of any organization in France that would work to implement such objective.

Yet in France there are no such groups, while here…here, we are talking about a whole system that is dominating all areas of our life - from the Prime Minister’s Office through the High Court of Justice and all the way to every radio station; because this is the real difference between us and any other country. The population is just as good and faithful, but what about the government?!

It appears the government is completely detached from the taxi driver who drove me home today from central Jerusalem, along the Old City’s walls. The driver, just like the rest of the population, cries with Jerusalem and feels the heartbeat of the Jewish people within it.

It appears that this group of people who walk around the corridors of newspaper and government offices represents itself only. When did we ever vote to implement the platform of the leftist Meretz? And when did the desire expressed by President Bush and by the least popular prime minister in our history become the “vision of generations?”