Rick Santorum: Jerusalem Is The Capital Of Jerusalem (Or Why We Should Have Presidential Elections Every Year)

Rick Santorum has a piece in today's New York Daily News: Jerusalem is the capital of Israel :

There is, sadly, a huge divide between the Obama administration’s position and that of the government of Israel with regard to Jerusalem.

For thousands of years, at the end of the Passover Seder as well as at the end of Yom Kippur, Jews around the world conclude their holiday by reciting, “Next Year in Jerusalem.”

To Jews, Jerusalem is the holiest city, and has the holiest site, the Temple Mount, which includes the Western Wall. Jews praying outside of Jerusalem face toward Jerusalem. When Israel became a state more than 60 years ago, Jerusalem, though it was divided at the time and the Western Wall was in Jordanian hands, was declared Israel’s capital.

Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court decided a case brought by an American Jewish family, the Zivotofskys, whose child was born in West Jerusalem in 2002. The Obama administration, following the Bush administration’s policy, opposed listing “Jerusalem, Israel” as the birthplace on the child’s American passport — despite a U.S. law requiring such a listing.


The U.S. Supreme Court, by an 8-1 margin, decided that the State Department could not wantonly break such a law and prevent the judiciary from reviewing that breach. I agree with that decision.

Even more startling than this refusal to list “Jerusalem, Israel” as the birthplace on an American passport was an exchange at a March 2012 Obama State Department press briefing. In an exchange with Associated Press reporter Matt Lee, the spokeswoman made it clear that even Jerusalem’s western part, the Jewish side of the city, controlled by Israel since 1949, is not recognized as part of Israel.

Read the whole thing.

Santorum hits all the key points about the historical ties of Jews to Jerusalem, the religious bond that Jews have with Jerusalem--as well as the Supreme Court decision rejecting the Obama campaign to erase mention of such ties in the Zivotofsky case. And of course there is the recent claim by the State Department that the Arabs should have a say in where in Israel Jews can have their capital.

Yup, it's too bad there isn't a presidential election every year--or has Santorum always been this outspoken about the rights of Jews and Israel?

Technorati Tag: Israel and Jerusalem.