The Israeli Broadcasting Corporation said that the Knesset decided not to allow the establishment of any consulates or diplomatic missions in Jerusalem, except for embassies.
On June 5, the Israeli Knesset approved, in preliminary reading, a draft law prohibiting the opening of diplomatic missions in Jerusalem to provide services to the Palestinians, in order to avoid the possibility of the emergence of a de facto status for Jerusalem as a shared city.
This project was submitted by Zeev Elkin, a member of the Knesset from the Likud Party led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and it needed to be voted on with three additional readings to become an effective law.
The draft stipulates that Israel will not allow a foreign political entity to open or operate a diplomatic mission in Jerusalem to serve non-residents of Israel.
The Knesset said, in a statement at the time, that no government in Israel allowed the opening of any representation of a foreign entity that was not intended to serve its population, and the reason for not granting this permission was the possibility of the emergence of a de facto status for Jerusalem as a shared city.
The Knesset pointed out that today there are 8 consulates in Israel that provide services to Israelis and Palestinians, but they were open before the establishment of the state in 1948.
These consulates are Turkish, British, French, Spanish, Swedish, Italian, Belgian, and Greek.
Hamas denounces
The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) took the initiative to consider the Israeli Knesset’s initial reading of a draft law prohibiting the opening of diplomatic missions in Jerusalem to serve the Palestinians as “retaliatory behavior.”
The movement said, in a statement, “The approval by the Knesset of the Zionist enemy (Israel) of a draft law prohibiting the opening of diplomatic missions of foreign countries in occupied Jerusalem to provide services to our Palestinian people is vindictive Zionist behavior.”
She stressed that this “comes within the framework of attempts to Judaize the Holy City, and to deny and erase our people’s national identity, their political existence, and their inherent right to their land and historic capital.”
She explained that “this measure is invalid and issued by an illegal occupying authority over Jerusalem and our Palestinian land.”
Hamas called on “the United Nations and all countries to reject and criminalize (the project), and to work to isolate the occupation and confront its fascist measures.”