Euroasian Jewish News

Serbia to Consider Position of Jewish Community on UN Assembly

After the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress (EAJC) published a statement in which the EAJC leadership formulated the official EAJC view on the UN General Assembly vote on the unilateral proclamation of Palestinian independence, members of the Congress and its partners intensified their efforts to explain our position to the general public and the governments of the countries whose Jewish communities are a part of the Congress. In some countries, Congress and local Jewish community leaders met with MFA and government representatives, and in others the Jewish communities and their governments exchanged their opinions in epistolary form.

At the EAJC's request, Alexander Netzak, President of the Jewish Community of Serbia (an EAJC observer) sent a letter to the President of Serbia Boris Tadic and the Serbia Minister of Foreign Affairs Vuk Jeremic, which contained a call to vote against the unilateral proclamation of the Palestinian State, but, for the sake of peace in the region, support a return to negotiations between Israel and Palestine. The leader of Serbia's Jewish community stressed in his letter that only two-sided negotiations with mutual concessions will lead to mutual agreement and a just solution of the problem. Alexander Netzak also noted that Israel never acknowledghed the unilaterally proclaimed Republic of Kosovo.

In his follow-up letter, the Serbia Minister of Foreign Affairs Vuk Jeremic stressed that Serbia's MFA values most highly the traditional friendship between the Serbian and the Jewish peoples, as well as the contribution which the members of the Jewish community of Serbia have made to this friendship. The head of the MFA promised that all of the aspects of the Palestinian initiative, including the Near East situation and the arguments of the Jewish community, will be taken into account should a vote be opened on the question.