Israeli policy on Jerusalem at the United Nations, 1948

Abstract

The 1947 proposal for the internationalization of Jerusalem, as an essential part of the General Assembly's partition plan, was accepted by the Jewish Agency (the representative body of the Jewish community of Palestine) only with extreme reluctance.' Jerusalem had had a Jewish majority since 1860, and in 1947 its Jewish population numbered 100,000, as against a combined Muslim-Christian population of 65,000. Fully onesixth of the population of the proposed Jewish state of 600,000 would thus reside in Jerusalem.2 Detachment of Jerusalem would diminish severely the Jewish demographic component of the Jewish state. No less critical was the significance of Jerusalem as a symbol of the revival of Jewish sovereignty. Jerusalem had served as the heart and capital of ancient Judea, and the restoration of Jewish statehood without Jerusalem would deprive the new Jewish state of a focal link with its national past. Failure to include Jerusalem would place in question the very meaning of the national future of the state. Little wonder then that representatives of the Jewish Agency in their appearances before UNSCOP (United Nations Special Committee on Palestine) and the various committees of the General Assembly argued vigorously for the retention of Jewish Jerusalem in the proposed Jewish state. If they acquiesced in the scheme for the territorial internationalization of Jerusalem, they did so only because they felt this was an 'inescapable condition for the immediate reestablishment of the Jewish State'.3 In the words of Ben-Gurion, 'it was the price to be paid for statehood'.4 The religious-political considerations which dictated this concession were explained by Moshe Sharett, head of the Political Department of the Jewish Agency: