President Donald Trump's move to recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital on Wednesday could have deep repercussions across the region.
Any
recognition of Israel's control over the city will be welcomed by
Israel, a close American ally, and be popular with pro-Israel
evangelical Christian voters who make up a key part of Trump's base.
But
it could also trigger violence in the region, derail a developing US
Mideast peace plan before it even gets off the ground and infuriate key
allies in the Arab world and in the West.
Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its capital, while the
Palestinians claim the city's eastern sector, captured by Israel in the
1967 Mideast war, as the capital of a future independent state.
These rival claims lie at the heart of the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The
conflict is focused largely on the Old City, home to Jerusalem's most
important Jewish, Christian and Muslim holy sites, and in particular on a
hilltop compound revered by Jews and Muslims.
The
compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, is the spot where the
biblical Jewish Temples stood thousands of years ago and is considered
the holiest site in Judaism.
Today, it is home to the Al Aqsa Mosque, the third-holiest site in Islam, and the iconic gold-topped Dome of the Rock.
While
Israel controls the city and its government is based there, its
annexation of east Jerusalem is not internationally recognised.
The international community overwhelmingly says the final status of Jerusalem should be resolved through negotiations.
Why is Trump doing this?
On the campaign trail, Trump took a strongly pro-Israel
stance and promised to relocate the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv, where
most countries keep their embassies, to Jerusalem. Since taking office,
he has learned that such a move is easier to talk about than to carry
out.
Under American law, the president must sign a waiver every six months that leaves the embassy in Tel Aviv.
In
June, Trump renewed the waiver, as a string of predecessors has done.
This week, another six-month deadline passed without Trump renewing it.
US
officials say Trump will again sign the waiver but will also instruct
the State Department on Wednesday to begin the multi-year process of
moving the US Embassy to the holy city.
The officials
say the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital will be an
acknowledgement of “historical and current reality” rather than a
political statement but that moving the embassy will not happen
immediately.
The officials spoke to reporters on
condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly
discuss Trump's announcement beforehand.
Recognizing
Jerusalem as Israel's capital could allow Trump to say that he kept a
campaign promise. It also will thrill Israel, whose prime minister,
Benjamin Netanyahu, is one of Trump's biggest supporters on the global
stage.
What effect will his declaration have?
On the ground, very little will change. Netanyahu's office
and official residence are in Jerusalem, as are the country's
parliament, Supreme Court and Foreign Ministry. Visiting world leaders
immediately travel to Jerusalem for meetings with Israeli officials.
For
its residents, Jerusalem is an open city where Jews and Palestinians
can move about freely, though in reality interaction between the sides
is minimal and there are large disparities between wealthier Jewish
neighborhoods and impoverished Palestinian ones.
But a US
declaration carries deep symbolic meaning by essentially imposing a
solution for one of the core issues in the conflict.
How will this be received?
Beyond the electoral concerns, there seems to be little upside for Trump in making a change.
Trump
likes to call an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement “the ultimate
deal,” and he has invested significant effort in laying the groundwork
for a peace initiative in the coming months.
His
son-in-law and close adviser, Jared Kushner, is leading that effort and a
close aide, Jason Greenblatt, has crisscrossed the region for talks
with Israelis, Palestinians and other Arab leaders.
The
Palestinians have warned that changing the status of Jerusalem would
mean the end of those peace efforts. They also have warned of mass
street protests something that could easily erupt into full-scale
violence.
International opposition to the move, including
from key American allies, also has grown increasingly strident. In
recent days, the European Union, Germany and France have all implored
Trump not to take action on Jerusalem.
The 57-member
Organization of Islamic Cooperation said changing Jerusalem's status
would amount to “naked aggression” against the Arab and Muslim world,
and the head of the Arab League said it would be a “dangerous measure
that would have repercussions” across the entire Middle East.
Perhaps
most significantly, Saudi Arabia spoke out strongly against the
possible American step. The Saudis are a key American ally necessary for
any attempt to forge a region-wide peace.
Will there
really be violence? Israeli security officials say they are monitoring
the situation and prepared for all scenarios. Israel and the
Palestinians also maintain discrete security ties in the West Bank that
have helped prevent violence from escalating in recent years.
Still,
much of the violence between Israel and the Palestinians in Jerusalem
and the West Bank over the past 20 years has been connected to tensions
in the holy city.
The city experienced deadly riots in
1996 after Israel opened a new tunnel in the Old City. The second
Palestinian uprising erupted in 2000 after then-opposition leader Ariel
Sharon visited the Temple Mount.
More recently, the city
experienced a wave of Palestinian stabbings in late 2015 in part
because of growing numbers of visits by Jewish nationalists to the
Temple Mount, and last summer, the city again experienced weeks of
unrest when Israel tried to install security cameras next to the Al Aqsa
Mosque after a Palestinian gunman killed two Israeli police officers.
Trump tells Middle East leaders he’ll recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump told Arab leaders on
Tuesday that he intends to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a
decision that breaks with decades of US policy and risks fuelling
further unrest in the Middle East.
Senior officials said
Trump is likely to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital on Wednesday
while delaying relocating the embassy from Tel Aviv for another six
months, though he is expected to order his aides to begin planning such a
move immediately.
Washington’s endorsement of Israel’s
claim to all of Jerusalem as its capital would reverse a long-standing
policy that the city’s status must be decided in negotiations with the
Palestinians, who want East Jerusalem as the capital of their future
state. The international community does not recognise Israeli
sovereignty over the entire city, home to sites holy to Islam, Judaism
and Christianity.
Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas,
Jordan’s King Abdullah, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al Sisi and
Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, who all received phone calls from Trump,
joined a mounting chorus of voices warning that unilateral steps on
Jerusalem would derail a fledgling US-led peace effort and unleash
turmoil in the region.
At the same time, a senior Israeli
minister appeared to welcome Trump’s decision on Jerusalem while vowing
that Israel was preparing for any outbreak of violence.
Trump
notified Abbas “of his intention to move the American embassy from Tel
Aviv to Jerusalem”, Abbas’s spokesman Nabil Abu Rdainah said.
Mahmud
Abbas, in response, “warned of the dangerous consequences such a
decision would have to the peace process and to the peace, security and
stability of the region and of the world” and also appealed to the Pope
and the leaders of Russia, France and Jordan to intervene.
The
Jordanian monarch, whose dynasty is the custodian of Muslim holy sites
in Jerusalem, told Trump that moving the embassy there would have
“dangerous repercussions” for the region and would obstruct US efforts
to promote Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, according to a palace
statement.
Jordan plans to convene an emergency meeting
of the Arab League and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation on
Trump’s new Jerusalem policy, said Foreign Minister Ayman al Safadi.
President
Sisi of Egypt cautioned Trump against “taking measures that would
undermine the chances of peace” and complicate matters in the Middle
East, a presidential statement released in Cairo said.
King
Salman stressed to Trump that any US announcement on the status of
Jerusalem “will hurt peace talks and increase tension in the region” and
said it would inflame Muslim feelings all over the world, the Saudi
Press Agency said.
None of the leaders’ statements said
whether Trump specified the timing of an embassy move, a notion that
successive Israeli governments have supported.
But US
officials said Trump was expected to sign a national security waiver —
as have his predecessors — keeping the embassy in Tel Aviv for another
six months, but would commit to expediting a move. It was unclear,
however, whether he would set a date.
Donald Trump, who
promised during the presidential campaign to move the embassy to
Jerusalem and is expected to announce his decision in a speech on
Wednesday, appears intent on satisfying the pro-Israel, right-wing base
that helped him win the presidency.
Israel captured Arab East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war and later annexed it, a move not recognised internationally.
‘A big mistake’
Israeli Intelligence Minister Israel Katz, who met US
officials last week in Washington, told Israel’s Army Radio: “My
impression is that the president will recognise Jerusalem, the eternal
capital of the Jewish people for 3,000 years, as the capital of the
state of Israel.”
Asked if Israel was preparing for a
wave of violence if Trump does so, he said: “We are preparing for every
option. Anything like that can always erupt. If Abu Mazen (Palestinian
President Mahmud Abbas) will lead it in that direction, then he will be
making a big mistake.”
Turkey threatened on Tuesday to
cut diplomatic ties with Israel if Trump recognises Jerusalem. “Mr
Trump, Jerusalem is the red line for Muslims,” Turkey’s President Tayyip
Erdogan told a parliamentary meeting of his ruling party.
Senior
officials said some officers in the State Department were also deeply
concerned and the European Union, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi
Arabia and the Arab League all warned that any such declaration would
have repercussions across the region.
A US official said
the consensus intelligence estimate on recognition of Jerusalem as
Israel’s capital was that it would risk triggering a backlash against
Israel, and also potentially against US interests in the Middle East.
It
is also likely to upset an Israeli-Palestinian peace push led by
Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, in pursuit of what
the US president has called the “ultimate deal”. The initiative has
made little progress. December 6th, 2017
Senate leader demands meeting of Muslim countries to discuss Trump's decision on Jerusalem
Leader of the House in Senate Raja Zafarul Haq on Wednesday
called for a conference of Muslim nations to discuss US President Donald
Trump's decision to move the US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.
A day earlier, Trump had informed Arab leaders of the decision, which breaks with decades of US policy and risks fuelling further unrest in the Middle East.
President
Trump is expected to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital later
today. While the relocation of the embassy from Tel Aviv has been
delayed for six months, Trump is expected to order his aides to begin
planning such a move immediately.
Washington’s
endorsement of Israel’s claim to all of Jerusalem as its capital would
reverse a long-standing policy that the city’s status must be decided in
negotiations with the Palestinians, who want East Jerusalem as the
capital of their future state.
The international
community does not recognise Israeli sovereignty over the entire city,
home to sites holy to Islam, Judaism and Christianity.
In
a notification issued today, Senator Haq raised concerns regarding
Trump's decision, which, he noted, has disappointed Muslim countries
across the world.
"The hope for peace and justice has been squashed with [Trump's] announcement."
Senator Haq noted that Trump's move will increase tension in the Middle East and its repercussions will be felt beyond the region.
The
senator demanded that an emergency session of the Muslim countries be
convened ─ similar to the emergency meetings of the Arab League and the
Organisation of Islamic Cooperation called by Jordan ─ to discuss
Trump's new policy.
Washington warned of turmoil
Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, Jordan’s King Abdullah,
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al Sisi and Saudi Arabia’s King Salman
have warned Washington that unilateral steps on Jerusalem would derail a
fledgling US-led peace effort and unleash turmoil in the region.
In
a phone call with the US president, Abbas “warned of the dangerous
consequences such a decision would have to the peace process and to the
peace, security and stability of the region and of the world”.
The Jordanian monarch warned that moving the embassy would obstruct US efforts to promote Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
‘A big mistake’
Israeli Intelligence Minister Israel Katz, who met US
officials last week in Washington, had told Israel’s Army Radio: “My
impression is that the president will recognise Jerusalem, the eternal
capital of the Jewish people for 3,000 years, as the capital of the
state of Israel.”
Asked if Israel was preparing for a
wave of violence if Trump does so, he had said: “We are preparing for
every option. Anything like that can always erupt. If Abu Mazen
(Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas) will lead it in that direction,
then he will be making a big mistake.”
Turkey had threatened on Tuesday to cut diplomatic ties with Israel
if Trump recognises Jerusalem. “Mr Trump, Jerusalem is the red line for
Muslims,” Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan had told a parliamentary
meeting of his ruling party.
Senior officials said some
officers in the State Department were also deeply concerned and the
European Union, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi Arabia and the Arab
League all warned that any such declaration would have repercussions
across the region.
A US official said the consensus
intelligence estimate on recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital
was that it would risk triggering a backlash against Israel, and also
potentially against US interests in the Middle East.
It
is also likely to upset an Israeli-Palestinian peace push led by Trump’s
son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, in pursuit of what the US
president has called the “ultimate deal”. The initiative has made
little progress.
