Outraged Israeli lawmakers have sent a letter to the European Union denouncing a secret document exposed earlier this week by Israel’s Channel 13 News team that revealed a brazen plan by the European Union to help the Palestinian Authority seize control over land in Area C.
Israel’s Channel 13 Exposes European Union Plan to Help Palestinian Authority Seize Land in Area C
The six-page document was written at the European Union’s mission in eastern Jerusalem and describes specifically how the EU plans to further expand the Palestinian Authority presence in Area C, territory under full Israeli legal and security control in accordance with the internationally-recognized Oslo Accords.
The letter, written by Likud Knesset Member Amichai Chikli, was translated into both English and German, and signed by 30 Knesset members, asking for clarification and an apology, according to a report Wednesday evening by the Ma’ariv news outlet.
“Engraved in stone upon the Arch of Titus in Rome is the seven-branched menorah of the Holy Temple as it was being plundered by the legions of Rome. ‘Jerusalem is lost’ – Hierosolyma est Perdita or Hep-Hep – became the Latin catchphrase used to deride and humiliate the Jewish exiles on European soil. In the 1930s, graffiti in a similar vein was scribbled on walls in the streets of Berlin: “Juden Nach Palästina” – ‘Jews go to Palestine’. And now that we have finally returned to Jerusalem and to the land of Israel, Europe would claim that we are foreigners in our own country, that we do not belong in our own homeland, the letter begins.
“Yesterday, we learned of an official policy document of the European Union, a document the gravity of which cannot be overstated, one that leaves no room for doubt as to the one-sidedness and animosity of the EU towards the State of Israel and the Jewish people.
“The document completely ignores our people’s historical affinity to our homeland, completely ignores the political agreements and the status of the State of Israel in Area C and seeks to establish the 1949 borders as Israel’s final-status permanent borders – in complete disregard of the Jewish communities in the area.”
The letter references the call by the European Union to monitor Israel’s archaeological activities at Jewish heritage sites in post-1967 territory because, the EU said, such activity is used by Israel to justify its hold on lands in Judea and Samaria.
“This singular call has but one goal: to subvert the deep and indestructible bond between the Jewish people and its country and homeland – its bond to the Hasmonean palaces and fortresses at Tel Aroma and Jericho, to Joshua’s altar on Mount Ebal, to our first capital in Shilo and to the tombs of our ancestors, our forefathers and foremothers, in the Cave of the Patriarchs and on the road to Bethlehem.
“No matter how many PLO flags you hoist over ancient Samaria or Tel Aroma, you will never be able to change one simple fact: The stones of Judea and Samaria – the stones of Jerusalem – speak our ancient language; and as one of our great poets, Natan Alterman, wrote: “No nation turns its back on its own heritage.
“Your efforts to expedite the Palestinian Authority’s seizure of Area C, while trampling underfoot the universal principles of environmental protection and preservation of archaeological sites, constitute an extremely grave breach of the relationship between Israel and the European Union, causing irreplaceable damage to natural and archaeological treasures throughout Judea and Samaria.
“Sadly, the document revealed yesterday exposes only the tip of the iceberg of the EU’s activities to undermine the State of Israel. We have not lost sight of your ongoing and continuous contribution, both direct and indirect, to campaigns designed to tarnish Israel’s name, from blood libels regarding alleged violence on the part of settlers, through unfounded accusations that Israel deliberately harms children, to specious comparisons of the policies of the government of the State of Israel to those of the Apartheid regime in South Africa of yesteryear.
“It is possible that we were mistaken in thinking that hatred of Israel, based on race and religion, has disappeared from the world. We are saddened to discover time and time again that through the masks of polite manners, and the so-called concern for human rights, the same blood plots are hidden. The same flames of primitive hatred seek to persecute this time – not the individual Jew, but the small Jewish state.
It is possible that part of the European leadership has already forgotten who made Jerusalem the eternal and unified capital of Israel over 3,000 years ago; but we have not forgotten! It is possible that part of the European leadership has already forgotten the price exacted from us by the loss of our political freedom – a price that no nation on earth has paid; but we have not forgotten!”
Chikli said in a subsequent statement that the letter was “unprecedented in its severity,” adding, “I really hope that the winds of hatred that swept Europe a few years ago do not continue to blow there even now under the guise of polite diplomacy.”
