America:If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy. - Psalm 137: 5-6.
This week's agreement at Annapolis to start comprehensive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks was always going to meet opposition from Israeli conservatives, but before the talks began, prime minister Ehud Olmert received a warning from another quarter - American Jews opposed to any partition of Jerusalem.
Divided between Arabs in the east and Israelis in the west from 1948 until 1967, Jerusalem is, along with borders and refugees, one of the "core issues" that must be agreed before a Palestinian state can be created.
Some US Jewish groups, mostly representing Orthodox Jews, have launched a campaign to stop a division of the city they regard as the spiritual and political capital of Jews throughout the world.
A former mayor of Jerusalem, Olmert gave them short shrift, telling Israeli journalists this week that his government alone would negotiate on behalf of the Israeli people.
"This question was decided a long time ago. The government of Israel has a sovereign right to negotiate anything on behalf of Israel," he said.
The Annapolis talks have the support of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations, which usually represents the American Jewish consensus, and of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the most powerful pro-Israel lobby in Washington.
Both groups have come under pressure from conservatives over Jerusalem, however, and AIPAC is already facing criticism from one of its main donors, casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, over its support for a congressional letter that urges the Bush administration to increase assistance to the Palestinian Authority.
Adelson is close to former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky, now an Israeli politician, who leads One Jerusalem, a movement to oppose the division of the city.
"The link between the Jewish people and Jerusalem is our moral justification for the state, and there is no way to give that up. The link to Jerusalem and yearning for Jerusalem is something that unites Jews across generations. It is the basis for religious and less religious Jews," Sharansky said this week.
American evangelical Christians have joined Jews opposed to any compromise on Jerusalem, arguing that Christian religious sites might not be accessible under Palestinian rule.
The Jewish daily Forward this week condemned the noisy opposition to Annapolis from people who claimed to be Israel's best friends.
"Something profound has changed in the meaning of Zionism. It used to mean solidarity with the people and nation of Israel. It's becoming something very different, less about people and more about apocalyptic theology. And that something burst upon us this month in a blatant, unapologetic manner that's nothing less than a watershed," the paper said in an editorial.
Olmert appears unconcerned about the Jerusalem lobby, but he told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz this week that he feared that mainstream American Jews could turn their backs on Israel if there is no two-state solution.
Opinion polls suggest that his fears could be justified because American Jews' attachment to Israel has been weakening with each generation. A survey published in September by sociologists Steven Cohen and Ari Kelman highlighted a growing distance between American Jews and Israel, which was most pronounced among the young.
The authors found that the decline in support for Israel was evident almost equally among young right-wing and left-wing Jews and suggest that the change could be linked with Israel's recent history.
"Those born after 1974 draw upon memories and impressions less likely to cast Israel in a positive, let alone heroic light. The first Lebanon war in 1982, the first intifada, the second intifada and the second Lebanon war are all perceived as far more morally and politically complex than the wars Israel fought between 1948 and 1974, casting Israel in a more troubling light," they write.
