A decade ago, at the start of the events marking the 30th anniversary of the liberation of Jerusalem, the city's mayor warned: "We are approaching the time of the decisive battle for the very heart of Jerusalem." And how did the mayor at the time, who went on to become acting prime minister and is now the prime minister, carry out that "decisive battle"?

At Sunday's special cabinet meting dedicated to the unification of Jerusalem, Mayor Uri Lupolianski summed up the results: "East Jerusalem is liable, God forbid, not to be under Jewish sovereignty ... Hamas will conquer Jerusalem within 12 years." In remarks reminiscent of the conclusions of a committee of inquiry into another decisive battle, Lupolianski said: "In order not to lose the city to Hamas ... a long-term strategic plan, not ad hoc solutions, is needed."

Lupolianski based his prediction on a study by the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies, the main points of which are: In the past 40 years, the city's Arab population has increased by 257 percent, compared with only 140 percent for Jews. Of the city's population of about 700,000, 34 percent is Arab. In 12 years this will rise to 40 percent, and by 2035 to 50 percent.

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At the official ceremonies that have been held over the past 39 years at Ammunition Hill to mark the city's unification, all prime ministers, including Ehud Olmert, have promised that Jerusalem will remain the undivided capital of Israel forever. Olmert made similar promises when he was mayor and had the authority to realize them. After all, at the end of the day, Jerusalem's unity is determined more through the daily physical implementation of plans than by grand pronouncements.

Olmert himself is waging the "decisive battle" for Jerusalem that he announced a decade ago with about the same skill with which he pursued the Second Lebanon War. This ongoing failure to impose total sovereignty in the capital of Israel - which his predecessors in the Prime Minister's Office share - requires, as in the wake of the Lebanon failure, a change in philosophy. Above all, we must instill in the people the belief that if we can triumph in a military battle, there is no doubt we can triumph in the battle for sovereignty.

The proposals to withdraw from the eastern part of the city are proposals of desperation rooted in the defeatist spirit that guides many of the country's opinion makers: Those who pushed for the Oslo disaster, the flight from Lebanon and the uprooting of Gush Katif, one of whose results is the Qassam rockets on Sderot.

Yesterday, the paratroopers who fought to liberate the capital gathered in Jerusalem to mark the historic occasion. Many came with their grandchildren after showing them the battle routes. They learned that the acts of heroism on Ammunition Hill, in the street of death and in Wadi Joz had not been translated into the necessary actions. All the governments that were voted in to carry through the great victory of the Six-Day War - of which the liberation of Jerusalem was the symbolic, historic and political peak - failed in this mission, and not only in the Jerusalem sector.

But if we only will it so, the situation is reversible: We must adopt a bold, ambitious strategy to ensure Jewish sovereignty in all parts of the city, including East Jerusalem, in parallel with increasing the city's Jewish population significantly. A special ministry, headed by a skilled senior minister with leadership abilities must be appointed to carry out this strategy. The budgets must also be in keeping with the goal.

There is a price to sovereignty. The absolute price - the price of life - we paid 40 years ago, with about 200 soldiers. They believed that in the wake of their sacrifice, Jerusalem would remain undivided. Their sacrifice is thus worth the economic and diplomatic price that must be paid to ensure that it was not in vain.