Why are semicolons not used after if/else statements?

Question

I understand that it is good syntax to use semicolons after all statements in Javascript, but does any one know why if/else statements do not require them after the curly br

Answer 1

Because the curly braces themselves are termination characters.

The are tokens that enclose a compound statement block and are intrinsically terminated. It's like putting a period at the end of a sentence, it signals to the parser that the thought is complete.

While being completely ugly it is valid to wrap every statement in {} and omit the ;