Corpus separatum (Jerusalem)
 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine |
| Jerusalem Corpus Separatum |
|---|
.png)
Corpus separatum is Latin for "separated body". The 1947 UN Partition Plan used this term to refer to a proposed internationally administered zone to include Jerusalem and some nearby towns such as Bethlehem and Ein Karim, that was, "in view of its association with three world religions" to be "accorded special and separate treatment from the rest of Palestine and should be placed under effective United Nations control". The United Nations Conciliation Commission in 1949 reaffirmed this statement.[citation needed]
The plan was not implemented; instead, Israel and Transjordan each took control of part of the area. Two decades later Israel gained control of East Jerusalem and the entire West Bank in the Six-Day War, and immediately annexed East Jerusalem to be part of Israel and of a united Jerusalem municipality, which however does not have boundaries identical with those of the proposed corpus separatum and does not include Bethlehem.
Later status of Jerusalem
The Israeli Knesset passed a Jerusalem Law declaring united Jerusalem to be Israel's capital in 1980, although the clause "the integrity and unity of greater Jerusalem (Yerushalayim rabati) in its boundaries after the Six-Day War shall not be violated" was dropped from the original bill. United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 condemned this and all countries today refuse to locate their embassies in Jerusalem; however, Bolivia and Paraguay have their embassies in Mevaseret Zion, a suburb 10km west of Jerusalem. On October 23, 1995, the United States Congress passed the Jerusalem Embassy Act saying that "Jerusalem should be recognized as the capital of the State of Israel; and the United States Embassy in Israel should be established in Jerusalem no later than May 31, 1999". Since 1995, the relocation of the embassy from Tel Aviv has been suspended by the President semi-annually, each time stating that "[the] Administration remains committed to beginning the process of moving our embassy to Jerusalem". As a result of the Embassy Act, official U.S. documents and web sites refer to Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. said that Jerusalem was the Israeli capital and should be the site of its embassy, but it has yet to move to the city.
External links
- Official map of the Jerusalem corpus separatum
- IMEU: Maps: 2.7 - Jerusalem and the Corpus Separatum proposed in 1947. Map from Institute for Middle East Understanding.
See also
- Positions on Jerusalem
- UN General Assembly Resolution 194, (1948)
- United Nations Conciliation Commission, (1949)
 | This Israel-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |