Status of Jerusalem in the context of "Corpus separatum (Jerusalem)"

Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. It borders Lebanon to the north, Syria to the northeast, Jordan to the east and Egypt to the southwest. Israel occupies the Palestinian territories of the West Bank in the east and the Gaza Strip in the southwest, as well as the Syrian Golan Heights in the northeast. Israel's western coast lies on the Mediterranean Sea, the southern tip reaches the Red Sea, and the east includes the Earth's lowest point near the Dead Sea. Jerusalem is the government seat and proclaimed capital, while Tel Aviv is Israel's largest urban area and economic centre.

The Land of Israel is synonymous with Palestine or the Holy Land. In antiquity it was home to the Canaanites and later the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. Its location at a continental crossroads brought demographic shifts under various empires. Nineteenth-century European antisemitism fuelled the Zionist movement for a Jewish homeland. Britain endorsed this goal in the 1917 Balfour Declaration and ruled Mandatory Palestine from 1920. Jewish immigration and British policies intensified Arab-Jewish tensions, and the 1947 United Nations (UN) Partition Plan led to a civil war.

Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. It encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, collectively known as the Palestinian territories. The territories share the vast majority of their borders with Israel, with the West Bank bordering Jordan to the east and the Gaza Strip bordering Egypt to the southwest. It has a total land area of 6,020 square kilometres (2,320 sq mi) while its population exceeds five million. Its proclaimed capital is Jerusalem, while Ramallah serves as its de facto administrative center. Gaza was its largest city prior to evacuations in 2023.

Situated at a continental crossroad, the Palestine region was ruled by various empires and experienced various demographic changes from antiquity to the modern era. It was treading ground for the Nile and Mesopotamian armies and merchants from North Africa, China and India. The region has religious significance. The ongoing Israeli–Palestinian conflict dates back to the rise of the Zionist movement, supported by the United Kingdom during World War I. The war saw Britain occupying Palestine from the Ottoman Empire, where it set up Mandatory Palestine under the auspices of the League of Nations. Increased Jewish immigration led to intercommunal conflict between Jews and Palestinian Arabs, which escalated into a civil war in 1947 after a proposed partitioning by the United Nations was rejected by the Palestinians and other Arab nations.

Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the oldest cities in the world, and is considered holy to the three major Abrahamic religions—Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Both Israel and Palestine claim Jerusalem as their capital city; Israel maintains its primary governmental institutions there, while Palestine ultimately foresees it as its seat of power. Neither claim is widely recognised internationally.

Throughout its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed at least twice, besieged 23 times, captured and recaptured 44 times, and attacked 52 times. The part of Jerusalem called the City of David shows first signs of settlement in the 4th millennium BCE, in the shape of encampments of nomadic shepherds. During the Canaanite period (14th century BCE) Jerusalem was named as Urusalim on ancient Egyptian tablets, probably meaning "City of Shalem" after a Canaanite deity. During the Israelite period, significant construction activity in Jerusalem began in the 10th century BCE (Iron Age II), and by the 9th century BCE the city had developed into the religious and administrative centre of the Kingdom of Judah. In 1538 the city walls were rebuilt for a last time around Jerusalem under Suleiman the Magnificent of the Ottoman Empire. Today those walls define the Old City, which since the 19th century has been divided into four quarters—the Armenian, Christian, Jewish and Muslim quarters. The Old City became a World Heritage Site in 1981, and is on the List of World Heritage in Danger. Since 1860 Jerusalem has grown far beyond the Old City's boundaries. In 2023 Jerusalem had a population of 1,028,366. In 2022 60% were Jews and almost 40% were Palestinians. In 2020 the population was 951,100, of which Jews comprised 570,100 (59.9%), Muslims 353,800 (37.2%), Christians 16,300 (1.7%) and 10,800 unclassified (1.1%).

Tel Aviv, officially Tel Aviv-Yafo, and also known as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a population of 495,230, it is the economic and technological center of the country and a global high-tech hub. If East Jerusalem is considered part of Israel, Tel Aviv is the country's second-most-populous city, after Jerusalem; if not, Tel Aviv is the most populous city, ahead of West Jerusalem.

Tel Aviv is governed by the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality, headed by Mayor Ron Huldai, and is home to most of Israel's foreign embassies. It is a beta+ world city and is ranked 53rd in the 2022 Global Financial Centres Index. Tel Aviv has the third- or fourth-largest economy and the largest economy per capita in the Middle East. Tel Aviv is ranked the 4th top global startup ecosystem hub. The city currently has the highest cost of living in the world. Tel Aviv receives over 2.5 million international visitors annually. Tel Aviv is home to Tel Aviv University, the largest university in the country with more than 30,000 students.

East Jerusalem (Arabic: القدس الشرقية, romanized: al-Quds ash-Sharqiya; Hebrew: מִזְרַח יְרוּשָׁלַיִם, romanized: Mizraḥ Yerushalayim) is the portion of Jerusalem that was held by Jordan after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, as opposed to West Jerusalem, which was held by Israel. Captured and occupied in 1967, this area was unilaterally annexed by Israel in 1980. The United Nations and other intergovernmental organizations consider East Jerusalem a part of the Palestinian territories according to international law, and under illegal occupation by Israel. Many states recognize East Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Palestine (such as Brazil, China, Russia, and all 57 members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation), whereas other states (such as Australia, France and others) assert that East Jerusalem "will be the capital of Palestine", while referring to it as "an occupied territory". In 2020, East Jerusalem had a population of 595,000 inhabitants, of whom 361,700 (61%) were Palestinian Arabs and 234,000 (39%) were Jewish Israelis. Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem are illegal under international law and in the eyes of the international community.

Jerusalem was envisaged as a separate, international city under the 1947 UN partition plan. It was, however, divided by the 1948 war that followed Israel's declaration of independence. As a result of the 1949 Armistice Agreements, the city's western half came under Israeli control, while its eastern half, containing the famed Old City, fell under Jordanian control, at the exception of Mount Scopus enclave. Israel occupied East Jerusalem during the 1967 Six-Day War; since then, the entire city has been under Israeli control. The 1980 Jerusalem Law declared unified Jerusalem the capital of Israel, formalizing the effective annexation of East Jerusalem. Palestinians and many in the international community consider East Jerusalem to be the future capital of the State of Palestine. The status of Jerusalem has been described as "one of the most intractable issues in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict", with conflicting claims to sovereignty over the city or parts of it, and access to its holy sites.

The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is an ongoing military and political conflict about land and self-determination within the territory of the former Mandatory Palestine. Key aspects of the conflict include the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the status of Jerusalem, Israeli settlements, borders, security, water rights, the permit regime in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian freedom of movement, and the Palestinian right of return.

The conflict has its origins in the rise of Zionism in the late 19th century in Europe, a movement which aimed to establish a Jewish state through the colonization of Palestine, synchronously with the first arrival of Jewish settlers to Ottoman Palestine in 1882. The Zionist movement garnered the support of an imperial power in the 1917 Balfour Declaration issued by Britain, which promised to support the creation of a "Jewish homeland" in Palestine. Following British occupation of the formerly Ottoman region during World War I, Mandatory Palestine was established as a British mandate. Increasing Jewish immigration led to tensions between Jews and Arabs, which grew into intercommunal conflict. In 1936, an Arab revolt erupted, demanding independence and an end to British support for Zionism, which was suppressed by the British. Eventually, tensions led to the United Nations adopting a partition plan in 1947, triggering a civil war.

The "Third Temple" (Hebrew: בֵּית הַמִּקְדָּשׁ הַשְּׁלִישִׁי‎, Bēṯ hamMīqdāš hašŠlīšī, transl. 'Third House of the Sanctum') refers to a hypothetical rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem. It would succeed the First Temple and the Second Temple, the former having been destroyed during the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in c. 587 BCE and the latter having been destroyed during the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE. The notion of and desire for the Third Temple is sacred in Judaism, particularly in Orthodox Judaism. It would be the most sacred place of worship for Jews. The Hebrew Bible holds that Jewish prophets called for its construction prior to, or in tandem with, the Messianic Age. The building of the Third Temple also plays a major role in some interpretations of Christian eschatology.

Among some groups of devout Jews, anticipation of a future project to build the Third Temple at the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem has been espoused as an ideological motive in Israel. Building the Third Temple has been contested by Muslims due to the existence of the Dome of the Rock, which was built by the Umayyad Caliphate on the site of the destroyed Solomon's Temple and Second Temple; tensions between Jews and Muslims over the Temple Mount have carried over politically as one of the major flashpoints of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and the area has been a subject of significant debate in the Israeli–Palestinian peace process. Most of the international community has refrained from recognizing any sovereignty over Jerusalem due to conflicting territorial claims between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority, as both sides have asserted it as their capital city.