Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat decides to hold the first Jerusalem International Marathon in March 2011. He gets Adidas to sponsor the event. An Israeli runner registers and then discovers that the route runs through some of the most egregious examples of discrimination and dispossession in East Jerusalem: Sheikh Jarrah, Issawiya, the Shufat Refugee Camp, Jabel Mukaber and Sur Baher (see map on right.)

He approaches the Meretz representatives on the Jerusalem city council and they, with international human rights organizations, approach Adidas. Adidas smells a possible consumer boycott and gets cold feet. The company demands “clarifications” from the Jerusalem municipality. What does that mean? Time (and persistence) will tell.

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Adidas considers withdrawing sponsorship of Jerusalem marathon

Yosi Eli, Maariv, December 10 2010 [Hebrew original here and at the bottom of this post]

The sports giant Adidas, which is sponsoring the Jerusalem International Marathon, requested clarifications from the Jerusalem Municipality about the manner in which the event would be conducted [sic]. Sources in the company [say they] are even considering withdrawing the sponsorship because of fears of a consumer boycott, after it became clear that the route also runs through neighborhoods beyond the Green Line.

The company’s communication with the Jerusalem Municipality follows a series of protests it received from human rights organizations across the world, demanding that the company cancel its sponsorship of the marathon, which is scheduled for March 2011.

The calls for a boycott came after a left-wing activist, who will be participating in the marathon, complained to the Meretz faction in Jerusalem. He said that it was not proper that the route run through neighborhoods beyond the Green Line. Among other things, the organizations are threating to start a consumer boycott of it does not withdraw its support of the race.

In their letter to the Mayor Nir Barkat, which was communicated with the help of the Meretz faction in the Jerusalem City Council, headed by Councillor Pepe Alalou and Dr. Meir Margalit, the [company's] managers clarification over the planned route. A source in the Jerusalem Municipality said that following the approaches to the company, some of the Adidas management and its board, requested explicit clarifications regarding the event, which will be held for the first time in Jerusalem.

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Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov [Israel Beiteinu] provides a policy-oriented explanation for the funding:

“The Tourism Ministry attaches great importance to developing tourism in Judea and Samaria, which is the basis for [the] ‘Every Jew’s Story’ [campaign] and is located in the very heart of the State of Israel,” the minister wrote.  “The historical heritage serves as a significant drawing point both for internal tourism and for tourism from abroad.”

It would be a stretch, however, to think that he actually believes this claptrap. Misezhnikov is a politician using his position to dole out pork to allies.

Last week Haaretz reported on a new domestic campaign, which aims to re-brand the West Bank settlements as pastoral tourist attractions. The settlers running it appear to actually believe that they are exposing an obscured reality, restoring the objectively positive image stolen from them. Samaria Regional Council head Gershon Masika:

Settlement’s biggest enemy is ignorance. That’s the place where prejudice takes hold, fertile ground for hatred and blood libels against us. We can change this situation through these tours.

From a narrow Israeli perspective, maybe they’re right. Within our Orwellian public debate, it’s often hard discern which perception of reality is upside-down.

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Tourism Minister establishing facts on the ground in territories

Yuval Karni, Yediot, September 20 2010 [page 6; Hebrew original here and at bottom of post]

While the Americans are struggling to arrange a continued construction freeze in the territories, there are those in Israel who are already preparing vigorously for the next stage.  Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov intends to transfer in the near future millions of shekels to settlements in Judea and Samaria for the purpose of developing tourist sites and attractions in the territories.

An internal Tourism Ministry document shows that in total, over NIS 9 million will be transferred to Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem.  Minister Misezhnikov, who is strongly opposed to the freeze, wishes to let the local authorities develop the tourism branch within their boundaries.

Many areas in Judea and Samaria will enjoy the benefit of the large budgets that the ministry stands to transfer.  The Samaria Regional Council will receive NIS 300,000 for tourism projects within its jurisdiction (signs in the Reihan forest, paving bicycle trails in the Shaked forest), the Binyamin Regional Council will receive NIS 100,000 for putting up signs in tourist sites, the Southern Hebron Hills Regional Council will receive NIS 100,000 to develop the Susya historical site, the share of the Karnei Shomron Regional Council will be NIS 100,000 for developing bicycle trails in Nahal Kaneh, and the Kiryat Arba Local Council will receive NIS 40,000 for planning tourism projects.

The big money will be given to the Etzion Bloc, the Jordan Valley and East Jerusalem.  The Tourism Ministry will transfer NIS 1.5 million for renovation and upgrading of the Herodion site within the boundaries of the Etzion Bloc Regional Council, about NIS 2 million to the Kasr al-Yahud baptism site in the Jordan Valley, and about NIS 5 million for developing projects in East Jerusalem: NIS 2 million for the City of David, NIS 1.5 million for Zedekiah’s Cave and NIS 1.5 million for tourism infrastructure in the Old City.

Tourism Minister Misezhnikov sent letters yesterday to mayors in Judea and Samaria and explained that he considered this a Jewish-Zionist necessity.  “The Tourism Ministry attaches great importance to developing tourism in Judea and Samaria, which is the basis for ‘Every Jew’s Story’ and is located in the very heart of the State of Israel,” the minister wrote.  “The historical heritage serves as a significant drawing point both for internal tourism and for tourism from abroad.”

In the letter, the tourism minister notes that upon the expiration of the security cabinet’s decision to suspend construction in Judea and Samaria, “I have decided to budget infrastructure, tourism and public projects throughout Judea and Samaria.”  The minister also instructed the settler leaders to turn to Tourism Ministry Deputy Director General for Infrastructure and Investments Shai Weiner in order to receive a commitment for promoting projects in the territories.

This comes on the day of the publication of the Jerusalem Municipality Master Plan, with plans for expansion of settlement enclaves across the city. Last night, riots broke out in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan as settlers, backed by Border Police, moved to evict Palestinians from a structure used as a mosque.

Israel began today building at the Shepherd Hotel in East Jerusalem

Channel Ten TV News, June 27 2010 20:31

Yaacov Elon: Very quietly Israel began construction of a new neighborhood in the Shepherd Hotel complex in East Jerusalem. Our correspondent Roi Sharon joins us directly from there. You can hear the construction sounds in the background. What’s happening there, Roi?

Roi Sharon: Work ended here this afternoon at the Shepherd Hotel in Sheikh Jarrah in East Jerusalem. Work began this morning, the construction that has already caused several diplomatic crises between Jerusalem and Washington, materialized this morning when the construction team arrived here with a micro fine drill and began the work. The story of this hotel begins in 1985, when the American Jewish millionaire Irving Moskowitz bought the compound and asked the Jerusalem municipality for permission to build here. The city planning and construction committee held the plans up for years and exactly a year ago the committee decided to give Moskowitz a permit to build 20 housing units here plus an underground parking lot. As soon as the decision became known a diplomatic crisis broke out between Jerusalem and Washington, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking Israel immediately to cancel the building permits. This morning the construction work began and now we shall see whether the work goes on as planned and whether we can expect a new diplomatic crisis.

Yaacov Elon: construction at Sheikh Jarrah. Thank you Roi Sharon.

Two more Palestinian families from East Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood received this week eviction orders. According to Haaretz’s report, the families were ordered to leave their houses within 45 days. No alternative residency was offered to them.

“Failure to comply [with the order] will force my client to act against you with all means available according to the law [...] in such a way as may cause distress, anxiety and large and unnecessary expense,” the notices said.

The lawyer who served the order, Anat Paz of law firm Eitan Gabay, informed the families they would be liable to a fine of NIS 350 for each day the remained in their homes beyond the eviction deadline.

Each family was also ordered to pay  NIS 12,000 per year for each of the last seven years. The notices did not reveal names of the claimants to the properties.

The Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah are refugees who fled their homes in Jaffa and West Jerusalem in 1948. They were offered a land in Jerusalem to build their homes on by the Jordanians in exchange for agreeing to give up their refugee status (ironically, that’s what Israel always demanded that Palestinians in Arab countries do). Israel conquered and annexed East Jerusalem in 1967 and, recently, the pre-1948 Jewish owners of the land in Sheikh Jarrah authorized a right-wing settlers group to have the Palestinians evacuated and the neighborhood settled with Jews.

Israeli courts have repeatedly ruled in favor of the Jews claiming land based on pre-1948 documents — while at the same time the Palestinians were forbidden from claiming back the houses they left in 1948. Unable to have their old houses, evacuated from their current homes — Jerusalem’s municipality plans on building there 200 housing units for Jews — the Palestinians have literally nowhere to go. They don’t even have refugee status.

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The injustice in East Jerusalem is so evident, that the struggle to stop the evacuation of the Palestinians became a new symbol for many Israelis. What has began as a very local grassroots effort by a handful of activist (many of them Anarchists) is now drawing a crowd of hundreds each week – and sometime more people and more than once a week. Here is a video from the protest two weeks ago, when some 30 demonstrators were arrested by police, and one had his arm broken.

Personally, I find the struggle in Sheikh Jarrah to be the best thing that has happened to the Israeli left in years. The number of the people present there doesn’t seem that impressive, but the crowd grows each week, and it is clear that the police and the municipality will find new evacuations very hard to carry out.

More importantly, this struggle is becoming an inspiration to many who all but gave up on political activism — and not just in Israel. And it’s happening without any political party or a left-wing organization supporting it, and under some very radical massages. For the first time I can remember in years, the left doesn’t try to “move to the center” in order to win the support of the more conservative public, or engage in all sorts of competitions in patriotism with the right — ones that we obviously will never win — but rather sticks to its principles without apologizing or justifying itself.

There is no common platform in Sheikh Jarrah except for this very specific struggle. Nobody asks if you support one or two states, if you are a Zionist, Post Zionist or anti-Zionist. People just come each Friday to Jerusalem and stand for what they think is right – and so far, it works well enough. Sometimes even I get the sense that if this thing wasn’t happening in here, it would have happened somewhere else. The energy feels bigger than this specific incident, as if there are finally enough Israelis who say that things have been going in the wrong direction for far too long — that a line had to be drawn, and it happened to be drawn in Sheikh Jarrah.

I took those two pics on the weekly protest last Friday, to which author Mario Vargas Llosa paid a visit.

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The best way to support the protest in Sheikh Jarrah is to simply come each Friday (more detailshere). If you don’t live in Israel, you can make a donation, as legal expenses for the defense of arrested activists and organizers are mounting.

Shachar-Mario Mordechai is a poet living in Tel Aviv. He is the 2010 recipient of Tel Aviv Municipality’s nationwide “Poetry By the Way” competition. His poems, translations and reviews have been published by various magazines, literary supplements and online site. His book of poems, “History of the Future,” will be published later this year by Even Hoshen Publishing House. A second book will be published by Am Oved as part of his prize for the Poetry By the Way competition.

If I forget thee

Shachar-Mario Mordechai, Maariv, May 12 2010 [Hebrew original here and bottom of post]

On Iyar 28, 5727 (June 7, 1967), the third day of the Six-Day War, IDF troops entered the Old City of Jerusalem. Within less than a year the Knesset established Iyar 28th as Jerusalem Day. After some three decades, while Binyamin Netanyahu was serving his first term as the prime minister of Israel, the Knesset conferred legal standing on that day: It established that this day would commemorate the connection between the city and the Jewish people and that, as such, it was incumbent upon us to celebrate it as a national holiday.

I am a Jew, and I do not forget Jerusalem (nor do I forget my right hand, and certainly not my left), and I recognize the undeniable connection between my people and the holy city. However, it is beyond me why I am obliged to celebrate (or lament) Jerusalem specifically in the context of 1967. I won’t, as Elie Wiesel put it, say that Jerusalem is above politics, since everything that is connected to Jerusalem — and perhaps to every issue in our world — is political.  And it is not inconceivable that any day chosen to celebrate Jerusalem Day should be imbued with political significance (even our distant neighbours to the east, the Iranians, celebrate Jerusalem Day — though it is a shame that they do not do so in the tradition of Cyrus). But in my opinion it is more than a tad unfair to mark Jerusalem Day — by law — in keeping with the whims of former MK Hanan Porat and the signature of Binyamin Netanyahu.

Where does that legislation put me? I, like many others in Israel today, believe that 1967 sowed the destructive seeds that have the potential capacity to derail Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state. I believe that the occupation of another people undermines Israel’s security, its standing among the nations, its character as a just society, the Zionist vision of a national home for the Jewish people in the Land of Israel (and not the entire Land of Israel), and that it also undermines our hold on Jerusalem.

In order to maintain Israel’s character as a Jewish and democratic state and in order to have Israel be — even if only partially so — a just society, there is no choice but to disengage from East Jerusalem. When I say East Jerusalem, my intention is a disengagement from the Shuafat refugee camp, Abu Dis, Sur Baher, el-Azariyeh. Certainly not from the Old City. Not from the holy basin. The Old City will be administered jointly so as to ensure that religious freedoms are not infringed upon and so that we will be able to visit the Western Wall whenever we want. And when I say joint administration I am not contradicting the words of the Prophet Micha, who said: “But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the House of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it…for the Law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

That is why I am hard put to celebrate Jerusalem Day on Iyar 28th. Why am I denied the right to celebrate wholeheartedly my connection — as a Jew and an Israeli — to the city? Why Iyar 28th? Why shouldn’t Jerusalem Day be established immediately after the mourning period leading up to Tisha B’Av, so as to commemorate the emergence from mourning over the city’s destruction to celebration over its rebuilding?  And when I say rebuilding I am not referring to Sheikh Jarrah. Just as we make the impossible transition from Memorial Day to Independence Day, why shouldn’t we celebrate Jerusalem Day immediately after Tisha B’Av? I know that Binyamin Netanyahu won’t pick up the gauntlet. But you there, you MKs who are worried about the fate of Jerusalem and the fate of Israel, can anyone hear me?!

Photo: Mati Milstein

Capital freeze: US Ambassador wants construction plans, Ministers hesitate approval

Ariel Kahane, Makor Rishon, May 7 2010 [front-page; Hebrew original here and at bottom of post]

The prime minister and senior ministers have vehemently denied over the past two weeks all reports of a de-facto Israeli agreement to freeze construction in East Jerusalem, but this appears to be the reality on the ground. No construction is being seen in East Jerusalem, and neither is such construction planned for the foreseeable future.

The main reason for this: fear of American wrath shared by the ministers as well senior public officials. A Makor Rishon-Hatzofe inquiry reveals that American officials in Israel have consistently “shown interest” — as this is formally defined —  in Israeli construction plans in Jerusalem. The US ambassador, the Jerusalem consul, and other American officials meet frequently with the relevant ministers and have been extracting from them detailed information on construction plans in the capital.

“This interest is not very pleasant,” says a source familiar with the matter, “each minister understands the significance when an American official asks him about the nature of the next project, how many housing units it will include, when it will occur and so forth. Some ministers are also calculating their next step.

“They understand that a refusal on their part to meet American expectations could prove detrimental later on, especially if they are seeking major appointments. It would not be clever for a minister to get branded as the guy who said no to the US.”

And the result: on the eve of Passover, tenders for some 1,000 housing units in Ramot were expected to be released. These were halted by a command from high up. This was also the case with 130 housing units in Har Homa. These are the projects available for immediate advancement if only the political echelon would approve them, and it has not.

Housing Minister Ariel Attias confirmed to the Knesset two days ago, that there was in fact an all-out construction freeze in the capital. In response to a question from MK Uri Ariel from the National Union concerning the report that the government was refraining from releasing 1,000 housing units, which have already been approved, Attias confirmed that such information was correct.

These are apartments in Har Homa, Gilo, Pisgat Zeev and Neve Yaakov. “The last time apartments were put on the market was in December 2009,” the housing minister said, “and since then no housing units have been put on the market.”

Ariel, chairman of the parliamentary lobbying group for Jerusalem, sent a letter to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in which he asked him to allow construction and approve the sale of apartments in Jerusalem. Ariel claims that the vast majority of Likud ministers are aware of this but do not dare to speak.

The Jerusalem police was having none of it. At some point in the fall of 2009 a decision was made: The protests would be suppressed. Over one hundred arrests ensued over the following months. The highhandedness of the police backfired. It brought media attention and, with it, local and international support. The courts also consistently sided with the activists and police disrespect for the rule of law became increasingly unsustainable. In February, commanders ceased dispersing the Friday protests.

Police still blocked the activists —  now organized as a movement called “Just Jerusalem” — from actually standing with the families, corralling them in a playground a few hundred yards away. Instead of declaring victory and moving on, the youngsters redoubled their efforts to reach the tents. Arrests resumed. One activist was taken from the Friday night family dinner table. In mid April, a group of intellectuals led by author David Grossman witnessed a police assault and spoke out. More Israelis joined the protests.

Maya Wind standing down the police on Friday (Photo: Philip Touitou)

Just Jerusalem’s has become a symbol for Israel’s anti-Occupation activists. Against all odds, lacking resources and organizational backing, the movement demonstrated the power of conviction and tenacity. Writing in this Saturday’s edition of the Financial Times, Tobias Buck, allowed recognition of this achievement to seep through his skepticism:

Six months, dozens of arrests and hundreds of newspaper headlines later, the small band of Israeli peace activists has surprised itself by taking on the appearance of a full-blown political movement.

The regular demonstrations have broadened into protests against the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land in general. Some Israelis also come to register their disapproval of police action against the gatherings, adding freedom of speech to the other grievances.

As a result, the protesters’ ranks are now studded with some of Israel’s most prominent intellectuals and writers.

The signatures of many of these intellectuals, including Israel Prize laureates Avishai Margalit and Zeev Sternhell, are among the ninety-nine at the bottom of an open letter taking Elie Wiesel to task for his sheer chutzpah in presuming to speak for those who actually live Jerusalem in his controversial full-page Washington Post ad, calling for a halt to US diplomatic action on the city (full letter here and at bottom of post; Haaretz report here.)

For more than a generation now the earthly city we call home has been crumbling under the weight of its own idealization. Your letter troubles us, not simply because it is replete with factual errors and false representations, but because it upholds an attachment to some other-worldly city which purports to supersede the interests of those who live in the this-worldly one. For every Jew, you say, a visit to Jerusalem is a homecoming, yet it is our commitment that makes your homecoming possible. We prefer the hardship of realizing citizenship in this city to the convenience of merely yearning for it.

UPDATE: It only took Eli Yishai afew hours to make a public course correction. At 3:32pm Ynet reported that the Minister was working to speed up construction in East Jerusalem.

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Note that this development follows a recent report that Shas spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, had stated that US-Israeli relations were more important than continued construction in East Jerusalem.

Yishai to Washington: I apologize for construction permits

Eli Bardenstein, Maariv, April 26 2010 [Hebrew original here and at bottom of post]

Interior Minister Eli Yishai met last night in Jerusalem with Director of the Middle East department at the National Security Council Dan Shapiro.  In the meeting, Yishai made it clear to Shapiro, a high-ranking administration official, that he regretted the insensitivity displayed during the visit of Vice President Joe Biden to Israel.

The permits in question were issued at the beginning of March, during the US vice president’s visit to Israel.  The Jerusalem District Planning and Construction Committee, which is under the responsibility of the Interior Ministry, approved a plan for the construction of 1,600 housing units in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo, sparking a crisis with the Americans.

In the course of the meeting, which was held at Shapiro’s initiative, Yishai made it clear to Shapiro that he attributed supreme importance to the Israeli alliance with the US administration, and promised that in future the Interior Ministry would know how to act with greater sensitivity during important visits.  However, Yishai emphasized that the Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem were the only neighborhoods in which construction could be carried out in East Jerusalem, and said that construction there would continue.

Shapiro—a key figure with regard to Israel-US relations and a personal appointment of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel—conducted the entire meeting in fluent Hebrew, to Yishai’s surprise and joy.  Shapiro always accompanies special US envoy George Mitchell in all his visits to Israel and Ramallah.

Meanwhile, PA Chairman Abu Mazen has requested to convene the foreign ministers of the Arab League before giving his consent to launching the proximity talks.  This was related yesterday by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in the meeting of Likud ministers that was held prior to the cabinet meeting.  “If there are no surprises,” he said, “the diplomatic process may begin in this format in the near future.”

Netanyahu said that the proximity talks would not deal with core issues, but only with “general issues,” and would only include an exchange of positions on several major issues.  “I told Mitchell that the most sensitive issues could only be resolved in direct talks, which should be reached as quickly as possible,” Netanyahu added.

Secret agreement on construction in capital

Ben Caspit, Maariv, April 26 2010 [Hebrew original here]

Israel and the US have reached secret agreements about construction in Jerusalem. Both sides agreed to leave the agreements between themselves and not make them public, and if they should be leaked nevertheless, deny them vigorously. The purpose is in order not to create difficulties for Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in the coalition, and particularly in the Likud party.

The agreements indicate that contrary to Israeli boasting, Netanyahu’s answer to Obama regarding Jerusalem was not “No.” It was something in the middle, a little closer to the far end (a freeze) than the close one (continued construction at full tilt). The most accurate translation for this agreement is “Yes, but.” It is possible that Netanyahu has learned something from the bad old days of Shimon Peres, during which he got the nickname “Yes and no.” Now it is Netanyahu’s turn.

The agreements were made in a very long series of meetings and discussions between the parties. Attorney Yitzhak Molcho worked for Netanyahu. Working on the American side was mostly Dan Shapiro, the director of the Middle East department at the National Security Council.

As far as anyone knows, the parties agreed that no construction freeze would be announced. On the contrary, Netanyahu may continue to announce that he did not agree to a freeze. But in reality, Netanyahu agreed to delay the Ramat Shlomo project by at least several years and not to issue any new construction tenders in Jerusalem.

He also promised “to do as much as the law allows and use his full authority as prime minister to prevent unnecessary Israeli activity in the Arab neighborhoods in East Jerusalem. These agreements do not include the procedures that are already being carried out, such as, for example, the Shepherd Hotel in East Jerusalem.

Another agreement between the parties is that if Netanyahu should encounter a particularly severe crisis or heavy pressure, or if these agreements should be leaked, there will be a tendency to let him approve a small number of symbolic construction projects in secret coordination with the Americans so that it will continue to look as though he did not give in.

In the end, the agreement is a good and effective one. The Americans are moving forward with it, and the members of the forum of seven are willing to accept it as well. It is saying no and acting yes. In the current situation, if there are no last-minute surprises, there will soon be an announcement of the resumption of the proximity talks between the parties. The Palestinians will go with it, and the Americans will finally be able to finish the job and check off the first item on their to-do list.

They made a big strategic mistake in their insistence on a construction freeze in Jerusalem from the first moment. They paid dearly for it. Now they will try to make up for it, but they will find fairly quickly that the worst of all is still ahead.

Netanyahu is not where they think he is. The reports that the prime minister has offered the Palestinians a state with temporary borders are premature. The plan has existed for a long time. It was created by Shimon Peres and Ehud Barak (and also, separately, by Shaul Mofaz). Just as he did then, Netanyahu has expressed his agreement in secret, but hopes that something will come along to blow up the whole matter, and not move it forward. Prepare for the next crisis.

On a more serious note, this is a potentially significant report that should be handled with care. Ben Caspit has a history of sacrificing precision for the sake of sensation and the source, Peres, is an incurable optimist, to put it mildly. Not that one should attach too much value to Eli Yishai’s denial either.

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef supports halting construction in Jerusalem

Ben Caspit, Maariv, April 22 2010 [page 6 with front page headline | Hebrew online original here]

Yosef

Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef believes that Israel must rebuild its relationship with the US administration at any price, even if this means stopping to build in Jerusalem.

This emerges from the details of a talk that Rabbi Ovadia Yosef held with President Shimon Peres about three weeks ago. Sources who learned the details of the talk told Ma’ariv yesterday that Rabbi Ovadia Yosef used very clear and sharp language, and this included an explicit statement supporting a temporary halt to construction in Jerusalem.

The meeting between Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and President Peres took place on Friday morning almost three weeks ago, in the framework of Peres’s traditional visits to important leaders on the intermediate days of Passover. In the course of the meeting, Peres reviewed for Rabbi Ovadia Yosef the state of relations between Israel and the US, the depth of the crisis and its harsh ramifications for Israel’s situation and standing.

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, say people who were at the meeting, took it hard. Yosef said, “everything must be done to work things out with the Americans, we must pay any price to rebuild the relationship, we must not provoke the nations and kingdoms of the world,” and more in the same vein. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef further said that it is possible to stop construction in Jerusalem for a time and to focus construction efforts in other areas such as central Israel, and that nothing would happen if we started building in Jerusalem again in a few years, after the crisis had passed.

When Peres described for him the compromise proposal (which Peres raised to Netanyahu), whereby Israel would declare a complete construction halt in Jerusalem’s Arab neighborhoods, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef also expressed support for this proposal. Peres, the sources say, pointed out that Netanyahu also agreed to this proposal but refused to declare so publicly.

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s statements reveal a situation in Shas in which the student, i.e., Eli Yishai, is more extreme than his mentor, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef. In response to Ma’ariv’s question, Eli Yishai said yesterday, “this never happened.” The President’s Residence had no comment. The transcript of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s statement was checked and cross referenced, among others, with people who spoke with Rabbi Ovadia Yosef after Peres’s visit. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef confirmed them.

In wake of this, political sources yesterday expressed amazement that every time the subject of Jerusalem came up in the Olmert government, it was said that “Shas will not agree to remain in the government if there is talk about Jerusalem.” They also said that in the meetings that Tzippi Livni held about forming a government in October 2008, Eli Yishai mentioned Jerusalem as a sine qua non, and then too, this was not, in fact, backed by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

The Shas leader’s comments also have significance from the coalition aspect and the international aspect: Netanyahu always has a good excuse when talking to the Americans about Jerusalem: he always says that his coalition would fall apart if he stopped construction in the capital. Now it turns out, at least according to what Rabbi Ovadia Yosef said three weeks ago, that this assumption is inaccurate.