Trump’s Planned U.S. Israeli Embassy Move To Jerusalem Met With International Protest

During his campaign for the presidency of the United States, then Republican candidate Donald Trump promised that, if elected, he would move the U.S. embassy in Israel from its current location in Tel Aviv to the actual Israeli capital city. More recently and since he won the election, Trump has gone about making the transition from the Obama administration to that of his own, and his incoming administration has been telling American allies that plans for the move were going ahead as promised. There are several parties welcoming the move, like Israel’s U.S. ambassador, Ron Dermer, who has said that the move would be a step toward peace in the region. But the international community has responded with a veritable outcry against the move to Jerusalem, pointing out that such a move would bring everything but peace.

CNN reported this week that the incoming administration of Donald Trump continues to tell allies that the Israeli embassy of the United States, which is in Tel Aviv, will be moved to Jerusalem in short order once Trump is inaugurated. Trump told pro-Israel lobby group American Israel Public Affairs Committee back in March that he wanted to “move the American embassy to the eternal capital of the Jewish people, Jerusalem,” and followed up during a television interview, saying that the move would happen “fairly quickly.”

But those who know the history of the region and the of the current ongoing negotiations between the government of Israel and the representatives of the Palestinian people, each of which claims Jerusalem as their capital and denies the claim of the other, see the planned Trump move as divisive, disruptive, and a potential diplomatic mistake that could very well result in an intensification of regional conflict.

The U.S. embassy in Israel was placed in Tel Aviv as a diplomatic approach to not seeming to take sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that has embroiled the Middle East for decades. A Trump administration move would dismantle those decades-worth of seeming impartiality, some believe, and as one European diplomat told CNN, it would jeopardize the peace process now in play, a process that has within it the peaceful acknowledgment of the state of Israel’s claim to Jerusalem as its capital.

“It’s very dangerous. Chances for the peace process are going very quickly — it’s now or never. Violence is always a concern and, at this point, it’s probably easy for Palestinians to demonstrate their frustration.”

His words convey even more weight after Sunday’s terrorist attack in Jerusalem, where a man Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says was affiliated with ISIS (via The Guardian) drove a truck into a line of Israeli soldiers waiting to board a bus. The attack saw four killed and injuring more than a dozen The driver of the truck was subsequently shot and killed by responding authorities.

Jerusalem as a seat of state has been a hotly contested issue since Israel’s declaration as an independent state in 1948. Contributing to the matter is that it is also a holy site for three of the world’s largest religions — Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. As BBC News recounts, the creation of the Jewish state, the modern nation of Israel, has also been looked upon by other nations in the Middle East as an illegal usurpation that displaced the indigenous Palestinian population as well. Several wars and smaller conflicts have been fought over the intervening years, and with modern history commingling with the traditional animosities brought about by the centuries of Crusades to the region, the Middle East has become a diplomatic quagmire.

And yet, Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., Ron Dermer, has applauded the Trump move. He has said that a Jerusalem move would be “a strong message against the delegitimization of Israel and of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.” He added that it “would be a great step forward to peace.”

Although Dermer’s position has support in Washington, it is not viewed unfavorably by many in the international community. In fact, as the European diplomat told CNN, it would be seen by Palestinians and other Middle Eastern states as a supportive move toward Israel by the U.S., thereby destroying the Americans’ credibility in facilitating the negotiations.

Or it could have worse consequences. “If it’s moved into East Jerusalem, the Palestinians would certainly view it as a provocative move,” another European diplomat insists. East Jerusalem is seen as Palestinian territory in the politically and religiously divided city.

Still, officials in Washington say that if the U.S. does go through with moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv, it could quickly do so by switching the signs on the Tel Aviv embassy with that of the U.S. consulate in West Jerusalem (with the idea of expanding the consulate to accommodate the much larger embassy staff).

Ever since 1995, after Congress passed the Jerusalem Embassy Act to acknowledge that the U.S. would move its embassy to Israel’s declared capital, each president has signed, every six months, the built-in waiver for the move — up until now used as the most diplomatic approach to the contentious political issue. President Barack Obama, citing “security interests,” signed the waiver earlier this month, giving the Trump administration just over five months in which to reconsider its promise.

CNN reached out to Donald Trump and members of his incoming administration for an update on the U.S. embassy move, but there was no response from the transitioning team.

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