Israel’s ambassador to UNESCO, Carmel Shama Hacohen, attributes the vote on the Temple Mount to an automatic majority enjoyed by Arab states, but says the Jewish state is having some success in diminishing it.
“Israel and the Jewish people do not need the approval of UNESCO or any country [to approve] its unique connection to Jerusalem in general and its holy places such as the Western Wall and Temple Mount in particular. No other nation has a connection to any other place in the world that comes close to the strength and depth of our connection to Jerusalem from a religious, historical or national perspective. It is a connection that has stood the test of 2,000 years, in which Jews everywhere in the world remember Jerusalem every day,” Hacohen says, according to Ynet.
Israel’s Ambassador to UNESCO Carmel Shama Hacohen. (Miriam Alster/FLASH90)
“The Palestinians and Arab states have an automatic majority against Israel in every institution of the United Nations,” he says, adding that Israel’s objective is to “erode and drive a wedge into this automatic majority against us.
“These efforts have borne fruit in the last two years. From the previous situation in which just the US was voting for us, we have gradually increased the number to six countries, and also increased the number of abstentions.”
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