We Say:

The debate over settlements in East Jerusalem has nothing to do with equal access to housing. There is nothing "equal" about the way that Israel has dealt with land, residency issues, and investment in East Jerusalem since 1967. Rather, Israeli policies in East Jerusalem since 1967 have openly favored Israelis of the city over Palestinians, and have openly sought to expand the number of Israeli residents of East Jerusalem at the expense of the existing Palestinian population.

The truth is, very few Palestinians live in West Jerusalem, and, aside from those living in the large Israeli-government backed settlements, very few Israelis live in East Jerusalem in areas that are an integral part of urban or suburban East Jerusalem. Those settlements were built for the express purpose of drawing Israelis into the part of the city that Israel conquered in 1967. They are built on the 35% of that area which Israel expropriated for the purpose of such construction. Notably, no comparable housing projects have been built by Israel for Palestinians in either East or West Jerusalem since 1967.

In addition, a small number of Israelis have taken up residence in enclaves in the heart of Palestinian neighborhoods of East Jerusalem - like Silwan, Ras al Amud, and Sheikh Jarrah. Their openly declared purpose is to displace the local Palestinian population and establish Jewish hegemony in these areas. Many of these efforts are based on the implementation of a Jewish "right of return" to properties that were owned by Jews before 1948. No comparable Palestinian efforts exist in Jewish neighborhoods of West Jerusalem, and no comparable Palestinian "right of return" has been recognized with respect to properties that were owned by Palestinians in West Jerusalem prior to 1948.

The bottom line is this: Israelis and Palestinians don't especially want to live together in Jerusalem. The reasons for this are clear, including a preference to live within one's own community and near where one works, where one's children go to school, and where one worships. Settlements in East Jerusalem have never been about promoting coexistence or establishing equal housing for Israelis and Palestinians in all areas of the city. They are and have always been about creating facts on the ground in order to prejudice any future peace negotiations related to Jerusalem and, potentially, to block a future Palestinian capital in the city. If this effort succeeds, it will mean that the two-state solution is lost, and with it, Israel's ability to survive as a Jewish state and a democracy.

We Say:

In 1995 Congress passed the Jerusalem Embassy Act, directing the president to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. That legislation gave the president the authority to waive the requirement to move the embassy if he judged it to be necessary for U.S. national security. Every successive U.S. president -- Republican and Democrat -- has used this waiver, recognizing that moving the embassy outside the context of a peace agreement would be provocative and would undermine U.S. credibility, threaten U.S. peace efforts, and harm U.S. interests. Efforts to force the president to move the embassy, despite all of this, are misguided and counterproductive.

We Say:

Symbolically and metaphysically, Jews throughout the world feel ownership over Jerusalem, the subject of yearning for generations of Diaspora Jews. This reality cannot be changed. But the physical Jerusalem is under Israeli rule and the democratically elected government of Israel is sovereign and empowered to negotiate over the future of the city. Jews who are not Israeli citizens are free to advise, cajole, support or protest, but the final decision belongs to Israelis and their elected officials.

We Say:

In our hearts, "Yerushalayim shel Ma'lah" - celestial Jerusalem - is and will forever be Israel's capital. However, "Yerushalayim shel Matah" - mundane Jerusalem of daily life on the ground - poses extremely delicate and volatile foreign policy and national security challenges for Israel. These challenges cannot be addressed through heavy-handed Israeli policies - like building settlements - that seek to exploit the absence of a peace agreement to create facts on the ground in Israel's favor. These challenges can only be resolved through Israeli-Palestinian negotiations and a peace agreement that delivers a two-state solution to the conflict.

The emergence of a Palestinian capital in Arab areas of Jerusalem doesn't undermine Israel's claim to Jerusalem as its capital. Rather, it could clear the way - at long last - for international recognition of Jewish Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

For the sake of Israel's security and stability, a formula must be found to share Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians, and between Jews, Muslims, and Christians. Pragmatic, creative solutions exist to satisfy competing claims to Jerusalem and its holy sites; what is needed is the leadership, courage, and goodwill to explore them.

We Say:

Contemporary Jerusalem is an "undivided" city only in slogans. On the ground, it is a visibly divided city. It is a city where one-third of the population is Palestinian, in addition to large Palestinian urban areas lying just beyond the municipal border. It is a city where the patterns of life reflect two distinct populations - Israelis and Palestinians - living separate and rarely overlapping existences. It is a city that has deep political, historical, economic, and cultural significance to Palestinians, and deep religious meaning not only for Jews, but also for Christians and Muslims everywhere.

Moreover, Jerusalem is a city whose boundaries have no historical or religious meaning. Many have forgotten that after 1967, Israel annexed large areas of land, including a number of Arab towns and villages, to expand Jerusalem. There is nothing sacred about these borders, either to Israel or to Jews. Most of the proposed solutions for Jerusalem's future would put Arab neighborhoods under Palestinian control, while Jewish neighborhoods would remain under Israeli control. These arrangements would make Israel's capital a more Jewish city and would allow Israel to shed the burden of ruling over Palestinians, while guaranteeing Jewish access to holy sites.

We Say:

Jerusalem has throughout history been the focal point of our collective yearning and our collective identity as Jews. The Jewish return to the Old City and its holy sites after 1967 was the fulfillment of this yearning. No one can deny or undermine the Jewish connection to Jerusalem. Jerusalem is and will forever be the capital of Israel.

At the same time, to assert that Israel should be forbidden from negotiating over Jerusalem is tantamount to calling for Israel to live forever by the sword, since a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is impossible without addressing the very real issues that surround Jerusalem. The price for keeping every inch of Jerusalem will be the loss of the opportunity for a two-state solution that will guarantee Israel's security and viability as a Jewish state and a democracy. This is too high a price for Israel to pay, especially when other reasonable options exist to resolve the issues.

We Say:

The lack of progress in peace efforts has produced a growing sense among Palestinians and in the international community that the time has come for the Palestinians to force the issue by seeking international recognition of their state.

The Palestinian move to seek international recognition of a state of Palestine, even under occupation, reflects not only frustration with the pace of peace efforts but an understandable desperation - a recognition that the situation is nearing a tipping point where developments on the ground in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, in particular settlements and settlement-related infrastructure - will soon make the two-state solution impossible.

The Palestinians' quest for recognition reflects this loss of faith in a negotiated settlement as well as a laudable commitment by the Palestinian Authority to use only non-violent means to try to gain leverage. However, while it is the Palestinians' right to seek international recognition of a state of Palestine, even under Israeli occupation, unilateral actions, by Israel or the Palestinians, will never be a substitute for negotiations and cannot resolve the conflict - something that the Palestinian leadership itself has recognized even in the context of this effort.

U.S. and Israeli demands that the Palestinians desist from this effort will be irrelevant until such time as a credible negotiating process is re-established. Absent such a renewed and reinvigorated process, support for recognition of Palestine, outside a negotiated peace agreement, can be expected to continue to gain momentum.

Courageous U.S. leadership and engagement are vital to restoring faith in negotiations that can deliver a two-state solution in the near term - the only real answer to the Palestinian statehood issue. Efforts to use the issue of international recognition of Palestine as a pretext for imposing additional conditions or sanctions on the Palestinians must be rejected.

We Say:

Violence in Gaza and southern Israel in the aftermath of Israel's 2005 "disengagement" doesn't discredit the concept of exchanging land for peace. Rather, it demonstrates the foolishness of the notion that Israel can substitute unilateral actions for negotiated agreements and expect results that are beneficial to Israel.

Even before the "disengagement" from Gaza took place, APN - which had long called for an end to Israeli settlement in Gaza - warned of the dangers of a unilateral withdrawal. We warned that by refusing to negotiate, or even effectively coordinate, the withdrawal with then-newly elected Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas - whose election platform centered on re-starting peace negotiations - Israel would undermine Abbas' credibility and deliver a public relations coup to Hamas.

We warned that under such circumstances, Hamas would likely gain more power and popularity in Gaza. We argued that Israel would be better off negotiating its withdrawal with a legitimate Palestinian partner who could agree to the terms of the withdrawal and accept the responsibility to uphold and maintain agreed-upon post-withdrawal arrangements and coordination mechanisms.

But then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was adamantly opposed to negotiating the withdrawal with Abbas. The result was evident in the 2006 Palestinian elections that catapulted Hamas to power and set the stage for the violence that followed. Ever since, Israel has been forced to grapple with precisely the unintended consequences we warned of in 2005.

We Say:

The debate over whether the West Bank and Gaza are "occupied" or "disputed" is not really about legalisms or semantics, but about ideology. The argument that the land is not "occupied" is most frequently articulated by people who support Israel holding on, permanently, to the West Bank and Gaza, and who support Israeli settlement in these areas. They support this, despite the fact that holding on to these areas undermines Israel's existence as a Jewish state and a democracy.

Whether you call the territories "occupied," "disputed" or even "liberated," one thing is true: Israel's long-term security and viability as a Jewish state and a democracy hinges on its ability to end the occupation and achieve a two-state solution.

We Say:

The West Bank and Gaza are viewed by virtually all international legal experts as "occupied territory." Since 1967, legal experts, including in Israel, have been virtually unanimous in recognizing this. The fact that the sovereign status of these areas was in limbo in 1967 is an artifact of the post-colonial era and, regardless, international law is clear: the acquisition of territory through military force is prohibited.

Even the Israeli Supreme Court has repeatedly used the term "belligerent occupation" to describe Israel's rule over the West Bank and Gaza. Indeed, Israel's Supreme Court ruled that the question of a previous sovereign claim to the West Bank and Gaza is irrelevant to whether international laws relating to occupied territories should apply there. Rather, the proper question - according to Israel's highest court - is one of effective military control. In the words of the Supreme Court decision, "as long as the military force exercises control over the territory, the laws of war will apply to it." (see: HCJ 785/87, Afo v. Commander of IDF Forces in the West Bank).

What matters, from this perspective, is the fact that the West Bank and Gaza were conquered by Israeli armed forces in a war (that the war was forced upon Israel is irrelevant) and have been controlled and governed by the Israeli military since. Who claimed the territories before they were occupied is immaterial. What is material is that before 1967, Israel did not claim the territories.

Even Ariel Sharon, one of the principal architects of Israel's policy of building settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, recognized this reality. On May 26, 2003, when he was Prime Minister of Israel, he bluntly told fellow Likud members, "You may not like the word, but what's happening is occupation [using the Hebrew word "kibush," which is only used to mean "occupation"]. Holding 3.5 million Palestinians under occupation is a bad thing for Israel, for the Palestinians and for the Israeli economy."

More importantly, the semantic debate regarding the "occupied" nature of the West Bank and Gaza is wholly immaterial when it comes to realpolitik. Whether one believes that these territories are legally occupied or not does not change the basic facts: Israel is ruling over a population of millions of Palestinians who are not Israeli citizens. Demographic projections indicate that Jews will soon be a minority in the land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River.