Trump puts Mideast on edge
President’s decision on Jerusalem isolates U.S. on a diplomatic issue
JERUSALEM — Palestinians burned photos of President Donald Trump in Gaza, and the walls of the Old City were illuminated with the American and Israeli flags Wednesday, as Trump made good on his campaign pledge to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
In a much-anticipated speech from the White House, Trump argued that it was “the right thing to do” to acknowledge the reality that Jerusalem is the seat of Israel’s government. Decades of avoiding that fact, he said, has done little to resolve the protracted feud between Israelis and Palestinians.
“It would be folly to assume that repeating the exact same formula would now produce a different or better result,” Trump declared. Recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, he said, is “a long overdue step to advance the peace process.”
Trump said that the United States still wanted a negotiated peace agreement — and “would sup-
port a two-state solution if agreed to by both sides” — and that he was not seeking to dictate the boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in the fiercely contested Holy City.
“There will of course, be disagreement and dissent regarding this announcement,” the president said. He appealed for “calm, for moderation, and for the voices of tolerance to prevail over the purveyors of hate.”
Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem isolates the United States on one of the world’s most sensitive diplomatic issues. It drew a storm of criticism from Arab and European leaders, including some of America’s closest allies.
Many said that Trump’s move was destabilizing, that it risked setting off violence and that it would make achieving peace even more difficult. It also threw into doubt his ability to maintain the United States’ long-standing role as a mediator of the IsraeliPalestinian conflict.
Trump’s break with policy and international consensus included setting into motion a plan to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Although that will not happen right away, Palestinians saw it as a deep affront.
The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, a veteran of the peace process, said the U.S. had effectively scrapped it. Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, called for the abandonment of a two-state solution altogether.
Fatah, Hamas and other Palestinian factions called a general strike for Thursday, urging residents of the West Bank and Gaza to join marches in every city, and officials said the Palestinian schools would be closed. Hamas, an Islamic militant group, said Trump’s decision would “open the gates of hell,” and Islamic Jihad called it a “declaration of war.”
By late Wednesday night, there were only scattered, unconfirmed reports of gunfire and clashes with security forces in several West Bank cities.
But the U.S. Consulate General in Jerusalem barred American government employees and their families from visiting Jerusalem’s Old City and the West Bank, including Bethlehem, already decorated for Christmas. Government workers were permitted to conduct essential travel only. Americans were advised to avoid crowds.
In Jordan, the U.S. Embassy said it had suspended public services, limited the public movements of employees and their families and instructed them not to send their children to school on Thursday.
But even as Arab and Muslim leaders across the Mideast condemned Trump’s announcement, doubts were raised about the stamina of the anger. The Palestinian issue, long a binding force in Arab politics, has slipped in importance, overshadowed by other conflicts.
Palestinians across the political spectrum said Trump’s decision was so biased toward Israel that he had irrevocably harmed his administration’s ability to be seen as a fair broker.
Analysts noted that Trump had said nothing about Palestinian aspirations to make East Jerusalem the capital of a state side-by-side with Israel.
Trump made no distinction between the western portions of the city and East Jerusalem. The Old City landmarks he invoked — the Western Wall holy to Jews, the stations of the cross sacred to Christians, and Al-Aqsa mosque, which is cherished by Muslims — are all east of the 1967 line, in what the rest of the world still considers occupied territory, said Nathan Thrall, an expert on the conflict at the International Crisis Group.
Trump’s formulation that the U.S. “would support a two-state solution if agreed to by both sides,” too, amounted to a rolling back ofpolicy flatly supporting a two-state solution, said Daniel Kurtzer, a Princeton professor and former ambassador to Israel under President George W. Bush.
“There’s really not much for Abbas to hang onto if he wanted to stay in the game with the U.S.,” Kurtzer said.
Israel’s standing in the world suffers when there is no prospect of peace negotiations, let alone a deal with the Palestinians. But Israelis on both the right and left dismissed the notion that Trump’s declaration was a death knell.
The right described it as more of a reality check. “It doesn’t matter what Trump says,” said Efraim Inbar, president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies, a conservative think tank. “It matters if the Palestinians are ready to compromise on this issue or not.”
And Dore Gold, a former director general of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and longtime adviser to Netanyahu, said, “Israel is not about to withdraw from Jerusalem, so it is time to get that notion off the table.”