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Palestinians urge US to ‘give Israel Washington, not Jerusalem’

In addition to urging the US to relocate the Jewish state to America, the Palestinian Authority also repeated its claim that the Western Wall is an Islamic site.

By: World Israel News Staff

With files from Palestinian Media Watch

In a recent announcement issued in the wake of the American recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the Palestinian Authority (PA) Ministry of Information expressed indignation by suggesting that US President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence should “give Israel the White House.”

The statement announced, “The ministry said that President Trump and his Vice [President] Pence can give Israel the White House in its entirety or give it Washington, the capital,” reported the independent Palestinian news agency Wattan last week.

On Facebook, Fatah posted a photo of Palestinians in Bethlehem burning a poster of Pence, with the caption, “Bethlehem Welcomes the Messengers of Peace Not the Messengers of War Pence Go Home.” At the time of the poster burning, Pence in fact was “home” in the US, having postponed his visit to Israel due to pressing legislative duties.

Western Wall is ‘Palestinian, Arab, and Islamic’

The PA Ministry of Information also repeated claims that the Western Wall is “Palestinian, Arab, and Islamic,” referring to the Jewish holy site only as the “Al-Buraq Wall.” The ministry also claimed that Jews have no historical ties or rights to it, announcing: “The ministry emphasized that the Al-Buraq Wall was, still is, and will remain Palestinian, Arab, and Islamic as UNESCO (UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization) determined when it rejected any historical connection between the Jews and the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque (i.e., the Temple Mount) and this wall.”

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Similarly, a PA official also trotted out the oft-repeated falsehood that no Jewish archaeological remnants have ever been discovered that corroborate the Jewish Temple’s existence at the site, stating, “They [the Jews] have nothing. They cry over the claimed destruction of the Temple, but Israeli archeologists themselves have searched under the Al-Aqsa Mosque and have not found even one Jewish archaeological remnant,” reported independent Palestinian news agency Donia Al-Watan on Monday.

The PA consistently denies any Jewish ties to the Land of Israel as a whole and specifically to the city of Jerusalem, a record that Palestinian Media Watch has documented extensively.

United Nations denies Jewish history

The PA’s rhetoric is reflected in actions taken by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), which passed a resolution in Paris on “Occupied Palestine”  in October 2016 that was later approved by UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee in a secret ballot in which ten countries voted in favor of the resolution, two opposed, and eight abstained, with one country absent (Jamaica).

In the resolution, UNESCO refers to Judaism’s holiest site, the Temple Mount, only as “Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif,” and presents it as an exclusively “Muslim holy site.” In the resolution, the UN condemns “escalating Israeli aggressions” and Israeli “violations” at the site, and calls on Israel “to respect the integrity, authenticity and cultural heritage of Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif … as a Muslim holy site of worship.”