London: Israel’s foreign ministry has chastised a senior Australian diplomat over Canberra’s decision to drop its recognition of West Jerusalem as the nation’s capital, labelling the move a “wretched decision” which risked encouraging extremists to further agitate in the region.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry’s political director, Aliza Bin-Noun, met with Australia’s ambassador, Paul Griffiths, for more than 30 minutes on Tuesday after he was summoned for a reprimand following the Albanese government’s decision.
The decision to no longer recognise West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel returns Australia’s policy to the international mainstream, but the timing has infuriated Israel.Credit:AP
Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who also serves as foreign minister, called the decision “a hasty response to an incorrect report in the media” and expressed “hope that the Australian government manages other matters more seriously and professionally”.
In a statement from the ministry, Bin-Noun conveyed that Israel would now consider its next steps in response.
The statement said she had expressed Jerusalem’s disappointment at the Albanese government’s change in policy, calling it “a wretched decision that ignores the deep and eternal connection between Israel and its historic capital and that goes against the good relations between Israel and Australia”.
She told Griffiths the move would encourage extremist elements in the West Bank to continue stoking violence, and risked destabilising the region amid heightened tensions with Palestinians as a maritime border deal with Lebanon was close to completion. She also objected that the decision came during Sukkot and Simhat Torah, when the Jewish people celebrate their special connection to Jerusalem.
A senior Israeli official told the Walla news site that Israel had reacted so harshly to Australia’s decision to backtrack because it feared its next step could be to recognise a Palestinian state.
“This is the reason we reacted so strongly and we are sure that got the message across,” the official said.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong said on Tuesday that Labor was fulfilling a longstanding commitment to unwind a “cynical” 2018 decision by the Morrison government, winning praise from local Palestinian advocates who urged the government to go further and recognise Palestinian statehood.
Under fire from Israel: Foreign Minister Penny Wong.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
Wong said recognition of West Jerusalem was a desperate attempt by former prime minister Scott Morrison to win votes in the 2018 Wentworth byelection by courting Jewish voters.
“Australia is committed to a two-state solution in which Israel and a future Palestinian state coexist, in peace and security, within internationally recognised borders,” she said. “We will not support an approach that undermines this prospect.”
Most countries that have diplomatic relations with Israel maintain embassies in Tel Aviv, reflecting an international consensus that the final status of the holy city, home to sites sacred to Muslims, Jews and Christians, should be determined in peace talks.
But a trailblazing member of Israeli parliament, Sharren Haskel, a member of the centre-right National Unity party, accused Wong of “pleasing her voters” rather than “standing by her moral compass” in her first intervention into Middle East policy.
Wong said on Tuesday that Jerusalem’s status should be decided through peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians, and not through unilateral decisions.
Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad also welcomed the Australian decision, describing it as a victory for the Palestinian cause and narrative, The Jerusalem Post reported.
Haskel, a member of the Knesset’s foreign affairs committee, lived in Australia for seven years working as a veterinary surgeon and volunteer for NSW wildlife service WIRES. She is a vegan, an environmentalist, a proponent of legalising marijuana and a champion of women’s advancement and LGBT rights.
“This idiotic action was more important to the Labor Party than to support children and women in Iran who are being murdered in their fight for freedom,” she said. “That’s what happens when you feel the need to please your voters more than the need to stand up for a moral compass, more than standing by the only democracy in the Middle East which gives full freedom and equality to children, women and minorities.”
Haskel last week cut her hair on stage at a conference in Jerusalem in a public act of solidarity with the ongoing protest movement that has swept Iran in recent weeks since 22-year-old Mahsa Amini died while in the custody of the country’s morality police. She was arrested for not wearing her head covering properly.
She told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age that Wong should recognise that Israel was the only country in the region which shared Australia’s values of democracy, freedom and equality.
“She should see that people from her community, from the LGBT community, everywhere else in our region, are being hanged, are being murdered are being persecuted, are being jailed,” she said.
Both Israel and the Palestinians claim Jerusalem as their capital. Israel captured East Jerusalem from Jordan in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed it in a move never recognised by the international community.
For decades the international community maintained that the city’s status should be negotiated between Israel and the Palestinians. Critics argue that declaring Jerusalem the capital of either inflames tensions and prejudges the outcome of final status peace talks.
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