UN envoy calls on Christians to condemn UNESCO resolution that ignores Jewish connection to Temple Mount and Western Wall

CB Condez Monday, May 09, 2016

The United Nations Education, Science and Culture Organization has adopted a resolution in April that apparently ignores Jewish claim to the Temple Mount and Western Wall. In response, a Christian representative to the United Nations is asking Christians to condemn the resolution.

A general view of Jerusalem's old city shows the Dome of the Rock in the compound known to Muslims as Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as Temple Mount, October 25, 2015. | REUTERS/AMIR COHEN

"By deliberately ignoring the Jewish connection to the Temple Mount, UNESCO violates the human rights of Jews everywhere, as well as those of Christianity, whose beliefs and heritage include the spiritual and historical connection of the Jewish people to Jerusalem and all of Israel," U.N. special envoy Laurie Cardoza-Moore said Thursday, as quoted by Breaking Israel News. "UNESCO is also obligated to promote and educate about religious tolerance."

The resolution, explained BIN, refers to the Temple Mount as Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif and the Western Wall as Al-Buraq Plaza, which is taken as deliberately disregarding Israel's ties to the holy places. It also repeatedly calls Israel as "the Occupying Power."

"The Executive Board ... Calls on Israel, the Occupying Power, to allow for the restoration of the historic Status Quo, that prevailed until September 2000, under which the Jordanian Awqaf (Religious Foundation) Department exercised exclusive authority on Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al Sharif, and its mandate extended to all affairs relating to the unimpeded administration of Al Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al Sharif, including maintenance, restoration, and regulating access," the resolution reads in part.

The board also "Strongly condemns the Israeli aggressions and illegal measures against the freedom of worship and Muslims' access to their Holy Site Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al Sharif, and requests Israel, the Occupying Power, to respect the historic Status Quo and to immediately stop these measures."

Cardoza-Moore, the UN Special Envoy for the World Council of Independent Christian Churchs and President of Proclaiming Justice to The Nations, said that UNESCO "vicariously supports a radical ideology that denies the Jewish connection to the land of Israel and its holy sites." She said that any prospect of peace is harmed by this resolution.

She acknowledged that Christians recognize this Jewish connection to Biblical sites in Israel, including Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, and if this connection is not defended, Christians, too, will lose their historic connection.

"We are calling on all Christians to contact UNESCO and condemn this attempt to re-write biblical history and replace it with political propaganda," she said.