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ISRAEL’S TRANSPORT MINISTER is pushing ahead with a plan to dig a railway tunnel under Jerusalem’s Old City, passing near sites holy to Jews, Christians and Muslims — and ending at the Western Wall with a station named after President Donald Trump.
Yisrael Katz’s plan, currently in the initial stages, involves constructing two underground stations and excavating over 3 kilometres of tunnel beneath downtown Jerusalem and under the politically sensitive Old City.
The project would extend Jerusalem’s soon-to-open high-speed rail line from Tel Aviv to the Western Wall, the holiest site where Jews can pray.
The route will run close to – but not directly under – the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where tradition holds that Jesus was crucified and buried, and a contested holy site known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary.
Previous excavations by Israel near the holy site – the spiritual epicentre of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – have sparked violent Palestinian protests.
Because of those sensitivities, the proposal will likely meet with heavy resistance from the Palestinians, neighbouring Arab countries and the international community.
Katz, a senior Cabinet official who also serves as Israel’s intelligence minister, is a close ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and is seen by many as his likely eventual successor as head of the Likud party.
Trump’s Israeli involvement
Transportation Ministry spokesman Avner Ovadia has said the project is estimated to cost more than $700 million and, if approved, would take four years to complete.
Katz’s office said the minister advanced the plan in a recent meeting with Israel Railways executives and has fast-tracked it in the planning committees.
Katz said a high-speed rail station would allow visitors to reach “the beating heart of the Jewish people – the Western Wall and the Temple Mount”.
He proposed naming the station after Trump “for his brave and historic decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital” earlier this month.
[image alt="Israel Jerusalem Train" src="http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2017/12/israel-jerusalem-train-296x197.jpg" width="296" height="197" credit-source="Sebastian%20Scheiner" credit-via="AP" caption="A%20view%20of%20the%20bridge%20in%20construction%20for%20the%20planned%20high%20speed%20train%20between%20Tel%20Aviv%20and%20Jerusalem" class="alignnone" /end]
Trump’s announcement has enraged the Palestinians and much of the Muslim world. The UN General Assembly overwhelmingly adopted a resolution last week condemning the move, with several traditional American allies breaking with Washington to vote in favour of the motion.
Israel captured east Jerusalem, which includes the Old City, in 1967, and annexed it in a move not recognised internationally.
The Palestinians claim east Jerusalem as the capital of their future state, and a longstanding international consensus holds that the fate of the city should be decided through direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
Digging railway tunnels to the Western Wall would also entail excavating in Jerusalem’s Old City, where religious and political sensitivities – as well as layers of archaeological remains from the city’s 3,000-year history – could make for a logistical and legal quagmire.
Last year, an initiative to convert an already excavated area abutting the Western Wall into an egalitarian Jewish prayer section was hotly contested by Israeli archaeologists, who said such a move would cause irreparable damage to the historic remains of the ancient city.
Despite the likely opposition to the project, Ovadia said he expects the plans to be approved in the coming year, barring major complications. The Tel Aviv-Jerusalem high-speed line is expected to open next spring.
“There’s no reason why this train won’t be built,” he said.
“We already know how to deal with no less difficult opposition.”
Katz has previously proposed other ambitious infrastructure projects, including an artificial island off the coast of the Gaza Strip that would serve as an air and seaport for the Palestinian territory, and a railway connecting Israel with Saudi Arabia and other Arab states.
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Same old same old… women really are treated like second class citizens in this country! Theres no way man would be treated so badly…!
@Pat Kelly: An yet, women in Ireland have a greater life expectancy than men. Strange isn’t it.
@Pat Farrelly: Women live longer than men in general, all over the world, even in less developed countries, it’s got nothing to do with their treatment.
@Pat Farrelly: the female advantage in longevity is based on an extensive number of factors which vary from area to area. Too many to list. But is mainly chromosomal and hormonal (eg males tend to have fattier organs and females have fattier skin) But the advantage is shortening in recent years in most developing countries.
So you can be less bitter soon maybe.
Of course they were,nothing to see here it was an oversight or just a “side effect”.
You might get an enquiry but no one will be held accountable and if you drop the case we might even compensate you.
It’s so sad, I was started on that medication over 20 years ago , and from day 1 I was warned about the risks , about 10 years ago they took me off it, they said that women of childbearing age shouldn’t be on it if possible. It’s scandalous that I was warned about it 20 years ago by my doctors, and other doctors never mentioned it to other women.
@Kim Keoghan: Doesn’t that suggest it was more a failing by doctors not the state? There is a problem with consultants with specialisations only treating that area and ignoring the whole patient. There is also a problem with communications between Drs and patients, which is not entirely on the Drs side. I suspect we’ll eventually have to introduce some form of recording of Dr – patient interactions that can be accessed if cases like this comes up so that we can actually hear what was discussed and what warnings, if any were provided. We’ve all taken medication that can have side effects, and many times we put the warnings out of our minds because we need the treatment. It’s only later if the side effects arise and if they’re serious that we try to remember if we were warned and was the warning strong enough.
Doctors have been dismissing women since medicine began. I’ve dealt with it many times.
Women have always been seen as hypersensitive or hypochondriac or too emotional or over anxious etc etc etc. That’s my experience and that was with female and male doctors. sodium valporate was first introduced in 1964, by 1984 it was already been associated with a number of anomalies affecting the neural tube, heart, limb, reproductive and urinary system, skin and facial features. And yet it took ’till 2019 for the warning to be put onto the product. 35 years! An apology is far from what is needed.
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