US President Donald Trump’s move to recognize the divided city of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital may have triggered a worldwide chorus of critics but the president had his ears closely tuned to his supporters at home.
For
Trump, the proclamation was an important way to make good on a pledge
to his political base, which includes evangelical Christians and
pro-Israel Republicans eager for such a move.
“While
previous presidents have made this a major campaign promise, they failed
to deliver,” the president had declared on Wednesday while announcing
his decision. “Today, I am delivering.”
Those were words
to savor for a president who’s been frustrated to see a number of key
campaign pledges stalled or slowed — sometimes by a bitterly divided
Congress, some by larger national or international concerns.
Repealing
the Obama era health care law is a promise unfulfilled, much to Trump’s
frustration. Withdrawing from the North American Free Trade Agreement
remains in his TBD column. And Congress has yet to approve money Trump
has requested for his promised border wall.
The president
counts the successful confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Neil
Gorsuch as a key victory. And he has acted on certain other campaign
pledges with some caveats: he refused to recertify the Iran nuclear
deal, but left the matter of new sanctions to Congress.
He
pulled the US out of the Paris climate change agreement but left open
the possibility of rejoining it later. And he ordered an end to a
program protecting young immigrants brought illegally to the US as kids,
but gave Congress six months to find a way to protect them from
deportation.
On Jerusalem, Trump had pledged during the
2016 campaign to recognize Israel’s claim to the city and to move the
American embassy there from Tel Aviv. He’s now checked that box —
although he offered no timeline for the embassy relocation and signed a
waiver officially delaying any move for six months.
Steve
Bannon, the president’s former chief strategist, repeatedly counseled
the president to take the step as a means of holding to his campaign
promise and energizing evangelical voters.
Observers were divided on how to score the president’s action.
“If
I were keeping score, I would rate this as fulfilling a campaign
promise,” said Bill Galston, a former Clinton administration official
now at the Brookings Institution. “Any move is significant and the world
is right to regard it as a serious step.”
But Douglas
Brinkley, a presidential historian at Rice University, saw Trump’s words
about the embassy as “just a grandiose statement on Jerusalem without a
line in the sand.”
A host of world leaders had urged
Trump in advance to reconsider his decision, warning that the action
could have serious and immediate consequences in the tinder box of the
Middle East.
But after Trump announced his plans from a
White House room laden with Christmas decorations, his backers gleefully
heralded the move.
An email from Trump’s campaign
operation trumpeted: “Jerusalem: Another Promise Made and Promise Kept.”
And conservative faith leader Ralph Reed, chairman of the Faith and
Freedom Coalition, said in a statement that Trump “continues to deliver
on his promise to the American people to strengthen the solidarity
between the United States and the people of Israel.”
Critics
warned the consequences could be dire, arguing that the move could
inflame tensions in the volatile region and complicate Mideast peace
efforts.
“My hope is it doesn’t change much, and we have a
couple days of protest,” said Ilan Goldenberg, director of the Middle
East Security Program at the Center for a New American Security.
Aaron
David Miller, a Middle East expert at the Wilson Center who has advised
Republican and Democratic presidents, called the announcement a
“triumph of domestic politics and personal ego” over “sound foreign
policy.”
Trump insisted he was not trying to derail a
peace agreement between Israel and Palestinians. He repeated the US
position that Jerusalem’s borders must still be worked out through
negotiation, saying he wants “an agreement that is a great deal for the
Israelis and a great deal for the Palestinians.”
The
president hasn’t hesitated to assess his first year in office as a
banner success, pointing to promises kept, such as the installation of
Gorsuch on the Supreme Court.
During a recent speech in
Missouri, Trump said: “I will tell you this in a non-braggadocios way.
There has never been a 10-month president that has accomplished what we
have accomplished.”
Trump’s critics see bold words, but said he often delivers half-measures or rhetoric.
“What
he does is he wants to give the perception of campaign promises
filled,” said Brinkley. “It’s making people feel there’s activity and
boldness going on. But what it is is rhetorical boldness.”
