United States
- The United States views as desirable the establishing of an international regime for the city. Its final status must be resolved through negotiations and it does not recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
United States policy on Jerusalem refers specifically to the geographic boundaries of the "City of Jerusalem" based on the UN's corpus separatum proposal. De jure, Jerusalem is part of the Palestine Mandate and has not been under sovereignty of any country since. President Bush (1989–1993) stated that the United States does not believe new settlements should be built in East Jerusalem and that it does not want to see Jerusalem "divided". The Obama administration has condemned expansion of Gilo and Ramat Shlomo as well as evictions and house demolitions affecting Palestinians living in East Jerusalem.
The United States voted for the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine in November 1947 and United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 in December 1948 following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War but voted against Resolution 303 in December 1949 that reaffirmed that Jerusalem be established a corpus separatum under a special international regime to be administered by the United Nations because the U.S. regarded the plan as no longer feasible after both Israel and Jordan had established a political presence in the city. The U.S. opposed Israel's moving its capital from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem following Israel's declaration of Jerusalem as its capital in 1949 and opposed Jordan's plan to make Jerusalem its second capital announced in 1950. The U.S. opposed Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem after the 1967 war. The United States maintains a consulate in Jerusalem that deals primarily with the Palestinian Authority, while relations with the Israeli government are handled from the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv. The U.S. consulate is not accredited to the Israeli government. The United States has proposed that the future of Jerusalem should be the subject of a negotiated settlement. Subsequent administrations have maintained the same policy that Jerusalem's future not be the subject of unilateral actions that could prejudice negotiations such as moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. In 2002, Congress passed legislation that said that American citizens born in Jerusalem may list "Israel" as their country of birth, although Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama have not allowed it. The U.S. maintains six buildings in Jerusalem with a staff of 471. In 2010 the consulate had a budget of $96 million.
Read more about this topic: Positions On Jerusalem
Famous quotes related to united states:
“... when we shall have our amendment to the Constitution of the United States, everyone will think it was always so, just exactly as many young people believe that all the privileges, all the freedom, all the enjoyments which woman now possesses were always hers. They have no idea of how every single inch of ground that she stands upon to-day has been gained by the hard work of some little handful of women of the past.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)
“There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration.... The United States does not concede that those countries are under the domination of the Soviet Union.”
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“In the United States there’s a Puritan ethic and a mythology of success. He who is successful is good. In Latin countries, in Catholic countries, a successful person is a sinner.”
—Umberto Eco (b. 1932)
“Then the American flag was saluted. In general, in the United States people always salute the American flag.”
—Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)
“We are told to maintain constitutions because they are constitutions, and what is laid down in those constitutions?... Certain great fundamental ideas of right are common to the world, and ... all laws of man’s making which trample on these ideas, are null and void—wrong to obey, right to disobey. The Constitution of the United States recognizes human slavery; and makes the souls of men articles of purchase and of sale.”
—Anna Elizabeth Dickinson (1842–1932)