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Russia Threatens Israel with Legal Action to Regain Ownership of 3 Churches in Jerusalem

This picture taken on December 20, 2021 shows a view of an Israeli flag flying near the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene atop the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. (AFP via Getty Images)
This picture taken on December 20, 2021 shows a view of an Israeli flag flying near the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene atop the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. (AFP via Getty Images)
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Russia Threatens Israel with Legal Action to Regain Ownership of 3 Churches in Jerusalem

This picture taken on December 20, 2021 shows a view of an Israeli flag flying near the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene atop the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. (AFP via Getty Images)
This picture taken on December 20, 2021 shows a view of an Israeli flag flying near the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene atop the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. (AFP via Getty Images)

The Russian government has demanded its Israeli counterpart to transfer ownership of three historic churches to Moscow, political sources in Tel Aviv revealed.

Russia wants state ownership of the Maria Magdalena Monastery, the Ascension Monastery, and the Viri Galilaei Church (People of the Galilee) all situated on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem.

The sources quoted former Russian Prime Minister Sergei Stepashin, who is responsible on behalf of Russia to regain assets in Israel, as saying that he intends to file a lawsuit at an Israeli court to force the Tel Aviv to return ownership of the churches to Russia if refuses to do so through diplomatic means.

According to Israel’s Yediot Aharonot daily, the new lawsuit is intended for internal propaganda in Russia in light of President Valdimir Putin’s declining popularity due to the war in Ukraine.

The newspaper said Russians are concerned about church issues and would like to see their president also interested in them.

“In Russia, they feel that the Israeli Prime Minister-designate, Benjamin Netanyahu, is facing difficulties in forming a government, and therefore, Russian officials believe this is the appropriate timing to put pressure on him to fulfill previous promises he had made to Putin three years ago,” according to a former political activist working in the file of the expulsion of Jews from Russia to Israel.

In 2019, Netanyahu promised Putin that Israel would transfer ownership of the Alexander Nevsky Church and Alexander Square in Jerusalem to Russia.

He said Israel must respond to the Russian claims, because its silence would harm Tel Aviv, especially in light of the war in Ukraine and the West’s united front against Moscow.

Meanwhile, a source close to the Russian Consulate in Haifa said these churches are Russia, and that the Church of Maria Magdalene houses the remains of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna of Russia, who was killed during the 1918 coup by the Russian secret police.

The Church also houses the remains of Princess Alice, great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria of Britain.

Ottoman and British documents show that the two churches and the monastery are Russian, said the source.

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Pupy the Elephant Heads to a Vast Brazilian Sanctuary After 30 Years in an Argentine Zoo

African elephant Pupy is seen in her enclosure at the Buenos Aires Ecopark, a few days before her transfer to the Brazilian Elephant Sanctuary, in Buenos Aires, Argentina April 11, 2025. (Reuters)
African elephant Pupy is seen in her enclosure at the Buenos Aires Ecopark, a few days before her transfer to the Brazilian Elephant Sanctuary, in Buenos Aires, Argentina April 11, 2025. (Reuters)
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Pupy the Elephant Heads to a Vast Brazilian Sanctuary After 30 Years in an Argentine Zoo

African elephant Pupy is seen in her enclosure at the Buenos Aires Ecopark, a few days before her transfer to the Brazilian Elephant Sanctuary, in Buenos Aires, Argentina April 11, 2025. (Reuters)
African elephant Pupy is seen in her enclosure at the Buenos Aires Ecopark, a few days before her transfer to the Brazilian Elephant Sanctuary, in Buenos Aires, Argentina April 11, 2025. (Reuters)

An unusual convoy neared Argentina's lush border with Brazil on Tuesday, after snaking through traffic-snarled roads for hours. Inside the specialized iron crate strapped to a truck and flanked by vans full of caretakers and veterinarians was Pupy, a female African elephant.

She is heading to a better life after spending more than 30 years in captivity as the last elephant of a Buenos Aires zoo that was often criticized for its conditions before it was turned into a nature preserve nine years ago.

Pupy (pronounced POOH'-pee in Spanish) embarked on her arduous 2,700-kilometer (1,670-mile) journey on Monday, from the trendy neighborhood of Palermo in Argentina’s capital of Buenos Aires to the Amazon rainforest of Mato Grosso state in Brazil.

The 3.5-ton pachyderm is expected to arrive at her new home at Elephant Sanctuary Brazil, the first refuge for elephants in Latin America, later this week — a voyage dependent on traffic, weather conditions and customs stops.

As of late Tuesday, Pupy was traversing the verdant northern Argentine province of Misiones, near the border with Brazil.

Standing upright in her crate during the rough road trip, Pupy sleeps and feeds on vegetables, fruit, grass and vitamin supplements. Brazilian park personnel and Argentine handlers monitor her condition during pre-scheduled breaks and through cameras inside the crate.

It took months to prepare Pupy for so many hours of confinement.

"She is making the journey flawlessly," said María José Catanzariti, a veterinarian and operational manager at the Buenos Aires preserve. "Sometimes in the first 24 hours these animals don’t want to eat, but Pupy keeps eating."

Pupy is just the latest in a series of over 1,000 wild animals — elephants, as well as lions, tigers, bears and apes — that the Buenos Aires "ecopark" has sent to sanctuaries abroad since its 2016 conversion from a ramshackle city zoo into a species conservation site.

Free from confinement, the animals build new lives in greener pastures. An orangutan named Sandra traded her limited, lonely existence in the Argentine preserve in 2019 for more roaming space and 22 new friends from her own species at the Center for Great Apes in Wauchula, Florida.

Already enjoying the Brazil Elephant Sanctuary are five Asian elephants — including Mara, a former circus elephant that also ended up in the Argentine preserve's enclosure and five years ago made the same highway trip to the refuge, where she now trudges at least 10 kilometers (6 miles) a day.

The Brazilian elephant sanctuary offers newcomers space to adjust to life in the wild, regain behaviors intrinsic to their species and socialize with others after so many years often spent isolated and alone.

Because Pupy can only fraternize with other African elephants, she will be alone adapting to her new habitat before the expected arrival of a fellow African elephant named Kenia.

From a zoo in the city of Mendoza, western Argentina, with a history of similarly poor conditions, Kenia is now undergoing training before making the trip to the sprawling multi-acre refuge, which evokes an elephant’s natural home.