Russia and the CIS (bbabo.net) - The long-term problem of restoring Russian property rights in the Holy Land became the main topic of telephone conversations between the Foreign Ministers of Russia and Israel Sergei Lavrov and Yair Lapid.

The Russian Foreign Ministry noted that the parties discussed in detail the soonest possible solution to the practical aspects of this issue.

We are talking about historical sites in the Holy Land, which are de facto the property of Russia.

Negotiations on the restoration of Russian property rights to these facilities and the withdrawal of Israeli state institutions from their territory have been going on since the mid-1990s with some progress.

In 1860, Emperor Alexander II ordered the purchase on the territory of Jerusalem of a plot of land where the so-called Russian courtyard was formed, which includes a number of significant objects, including the Trinity Cathedral, houses for pilgrims, the building of the Spiritual Mission and the Sergievsky courtyard.

With the occupation of the Palestinian territories by Israel in 1948, the territory of the Russian courtyard came under its control. However, the Israeli authorities recognized the ownership of the ROC to some of the buildings. A little less than 20 years later, the Soviet authorities sold all the buildings of the courtyard to the Israeli side, with the exception of the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity and the building of the Spiritual Mission. As historians note, the price of the issue was a batch of oranges worth about $ 5 million. In 1967, amid the severance of diplomatic relations and the expanded occupation of Palestine, Israel declared itself the tenant of the cathedral and the mission building. With the coming to power in the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, he managed to achieve the return of the Russian courtyard.

bbabo.Net