Two Jerusalems?

Yes, in fact there are. In insisting that there are ‘two Jerusalems’ – one for the Arabs and one for the Jews – outsiders like the Community Organizer and his Merry Men are technically right but factually wrong.

There are two Jerusalems -- not the ‘east’ and ‘west’ Jerusalem the media is crowing about these days -- ‘East’ Jerusalem for the Arabs, ‘West Jerusalem’ of the Jews.
That part is a myth. There is no ‘east’ and ‘west’ distinction in the City.

Jerusalem is not now and has never been an Arab city. Since 1870, there’s been a Jewish majority in this city.

Eli Hertz furnishes some statistics:
In 1880, Jews constituted 52 percent of the Old City population in East Jerusalem and were still inhabiting 42 percent of the Old City in 1914.
In 1948, there were 100,000 Jews in Jerusalem, with 65,000 Arabs.
By 1961, a joint Jordanian-Israeli census reported that 67.7 percent of the city's population was Jewish.
A 1967 aerial photo reveals the truth about the area called 'East Jerusalem': it was no more than an overcrowded walled city with a few scattered neighborhoods surrounded by villages.

When the Arabs attacked in 1967 and Israel beat them back, Israel then annexed the territory – including all of Jerusalem – to make sure those attacks wouldn’t happen again, and so that we could retake our holiest sites, the City of David and the Kotel, the Western Wall, all that remains of Solomon’s Temple.

Of course, what we should have done, back then, was to annex Judea and Samaria, too. Our mistake. In any event, after that annexation, Jerusalem them became the largest city in Israel. A Jewish city.

Today, when Arabs demand “east” Jerusalem, what they really want are Jewish holy sites -- including the Jewish Quarter in the Old City and the Kotel, because they know (even if much of the world seems to have forgotten) that if they can cut the Jews off from the Western Wall, and from the eternal source of strength which flows from that site, they will find us an easier target.

The Arabs now claim all the rocky land (pictured in the previous blog) that lies around the city, too, land that’s been open and in the public domain for the past 42 years. What nonsense.

The truth is, Jerusalem – now with a population of 750,000 -- will never again be divided. There will be no separation of “east” and “west”. Not now, not ever.

All that said, there are TWO Jerusalems.

First of all, consider the name: Yerushalaim – the ending “aim” in Hebrew indicates a plural, two, a pair of things.

That’s because, according to the Kabbalah, a heavenly Jerusalem exists 18 miles above the earthly city. The city below is the earthly, modern city. The one above is the city of purity, goodness, holiness and splendor. In the mystical commentary on Berakhot, it says, “There is a Jerusalem above aligned with the Jerusalem below. Out of His love for the one below, He has fashioned another above…. He has sworn that His Presence shall not enter the heavenly Jerusalem until the earthly Jerusalem has been rebuilt.”

Both Jerusalems already exist. And just as it says in Psalms 122:3: “Jerusalem, built as a city that is compact together” -- that is, the two are forever bound together. One day -- may it be soon and in our time – the heavenly Jerusalem will descend unto the earthly Jerusalem.

That being the case, the earthly Jerusalem will never be divided.

All this nonsense about “east” and “west” Jerusalem is just silly. It’s Arab dreaming, bolstered by pandering from the Community Organizer.

The two Jerusalems that already exist – the earthly city and the heavenly city, 18 miles above – will never again be separated.