Twenty mayors from around the world who are on a visit to Israel have denounced recent resolutions by UNESCO, the United Nations’ cultural agency, which denied the Jewish historical connection to Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, The Times of Israel reported Thursday.

The 20 mayors are visiting Israel this week as part of the 31st International Mayors Conference.

Their statement said that the mayors intended “to work to end politically inspired falsehood and distortions, and to speak the truth about all relevant history.” It slammed UNESCO for “injecting false narratives as part of a disinformation campaign by biased parties,” and demanded that it stop doing so.

The cities whose mayors signed the statement include Beverly Hills and Miami Beach in the United States; Tainan, Taiwan; Lviv, Ukraine; San Miguelito, Panama; Jaen, Spain; and George, South Africa.

The mayoral delegation met with a number of high-tech entrepreneurs as well as some of their Israeli counterparts, including Ron Huldai of Tel Aviv and Nir Barkat of Jerusalem.

Jack Rosen, the president of the American Jewish Congress, which organized the junket, told The Jerusalem Post that relationships developed with mayors can pay off: among those who have participated in similar delegations in the past were Mauricio Macri, now president of Argentina, and Matteo Renzi, now prime minister of Italy.

The UNESCO resolutions’ ahistorical nature was highlighted by the Israel Antiquities Authority’s announcement last month that it had found the site where the Romans breached the walls of Jerusalem prior to the destruction of the second Jewish Temple, nearly 2,000 years ago. A long-overlooked 10th century inscription on a mosque near Hebron was also rediscovered last month; it acknowledges the presence of the Jewish temples in Jerusalem.

[Photo: Ze’ev Barkan / Flickr ]