It took Donald Trump less than a year. Now – after setting ablaze every sensitive issue in American public life and after alienating some of our closest international allies – he has tossed a firebomb into Jerusalem, the most combustible place on earth.

For those who had illusions about his ability to strike what he calls "the ultimate deal," Trump’s unilateral, reckless and diplomatically useless recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital serves as a bitter reality check.

Since Trump’s announcement last week, I’ve heard many doomsday expressions. The hyperbole, as well as the cycle of disappointment, violence and bloodshed make it easy to succumb to "hope fatigue."

Please read the following letter I’ve written for Americans for Peace Now about the remedy for such fatigue - it is being mailed now to tens of thousands of American households - and please consider including APN in your end-of-year giving.

If APN represents your voice, as it does mine, please consider joining me in making a generous year-end donation.

In peace,

Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

This week, Alpher discusses Arab and Muslim reactions to President Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem; some interesting responses from independent-minded Israelis and others; what everyone is fighting over and what "Alpher's Jerusalem"looks like; what it might look like if the Palestinian chief negotiator declared, “the two-state solution is over” and Palestinians begin to seek Israeli citizenship in a one-state solution.

On December 7^th, 2017, APN hosted former US consul General in Jerusalem, Jacob (Jake) Walles. Ambassador Walles spoke about the repercussions of President Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and his decision to start preparations for transferring America’s Israel embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.  

Join APN for a briefing call on Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital and its repercussions with Ambassador Jacob (Jake) Walles, Former US Consul General to Jerusalem.

Listen here

Donald Trump today sabotaged decades of American efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. By announcing his disastrous new policy on Jerusalem, he is causing severe damage to the prospects of Middle East peace, imperiling lives, and degrading US leadership.

Defying the counsel of America's top diplomats and security experts, as well as the urging of US regional and international allies, Trump decided to put politics before policy, to cater to domestic extremists in his political base, and to toss a match into the most combustible place on earth: the holy city of Jerusalem. Trump's irresponsible action has further eroded American prestige and influence in the international arena.

Americans for Peace Now strongly opposes any move by the Trump Administration to alter longstanding US policy on Jerusalem outside the context of a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. Here is what you need to know:

• 1. President Trump made a landmark announcement on Jerusalem on December 6th.

President Trump did two things in his speech: he reversed 70 years of American policy by recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and he announced plans to move the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.  

• 2. Recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, without any acknowledgment of Palestinian claims to Jerusalem, is the root of the problem.

Jerusalem is Israel’s capital. But the timing of international, and particularly American, recognition of this matters – as do the particular borders of Jerusalem that are recognized. The reason is that Palestinians also have legitimate claims to Jerusalem as the capital of their eventual state and any realistic peace plan includes at least some portion of East Jerusalem as that capital.

Moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, in the absence of a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, recognizes Israeli claims to Jerusalem while giving the Palestinians nothing. And timing matters. Trump’s impending announcement is occurring as Congress prepares to cut, through the Taylor Force Act, aid that would benefit the Palestinian Authority, and following Trump’s near-decision to close the PLO mission to Washington. (Since Trump's announcement, PA President Mahmoud Abbas recalled Palestinian diplomats in protest.) Adding to that, US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and/or relocation of the US embassy creates a “triple whammy” against the Palestinians. It will severely damage American credibility as an honest broker of peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and in foreign policy more broadly. So much for President Trump’s avowed desire to make the “ultimate deal.”

The world holds its breath as President Trump prepares to unveil his administration's new policy on Jerusalem. Will he move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem? Will the US recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital? What are the implications for Israelis and Palestinians and the prospects for peace?

• APN's Debra Shushan in Haaretz: As Trump and Netanyahu Meet, Our Plea as Interfaith Leaders: Stop Boosting the Proponents of a Religious War
• APN's Debra Shushan in Haaretz: The Israeli 'Left' Is Gaslighting U.S. Jews Into Support for Trump on Jerusalem
• APN: Trump's Jerusalem Move Sabotages Prospects for Peace, Endangers Lives, Degrades US Leadership
• 7 Things You Should Know: Trump’s Decision on Jerusalem
• US Public Opinion on Embassy Move: Polling Graphic
• They Say/We Say on Jerusalem
• Yossi Alpher Analysis
• Organizations Specializing on Jerusalem:
  - Americans for Peace Now
  - Shalom Achshav (Peace Now)
  - Terrestrial Jerusalem
  - Ir Amim
• Temple Mount Crisis Resource Page
• Further Recommended Reading:
  - Peace Now:  President Trump’s declaration on Jerusalem is Bad News for Israel; 12/6/17
  - Jake Walles: A Capital Offense
  - Gershom Gorenberg’s Capital Offense
  - David Makovsky on Trump’s diplomatic challenge in framing his announcement
  - Haaretz backgrounder: Jerusalem for Dummies: Why the World Doesn’t Recognize It as Israel’s Capital
  - New York Times mini-video: Why Jerusalem is a Controversial Capital
  - New York Times timeline: the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Jerusalem
  - Vox: Trump’s plan to declare Jerusalem the capital of Israel will derail decades of US diplomacy

Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

This week, Alpher discusses whether Trump will announce his decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital and whether this would spark the next intifada; the settlements issue as part of the Trump-Russia investigation; the 70th anniversary of the United Nations decision to partition Palestine and the Palestinians' and Arab countries' rejection of it in 1947; and whether the Netanyahu government should and could have intervened in Syria in 2012, toppled the Assad regime and installed the secular opposition in power.

Facts matter.

And they particularly matter when it comes to a respectable publication like Bloomberg.com and a reputable journalist such as Eli Lake.

In an article that discusses the Trump transition team’s apparent efforts to lobby foreign governments to veto a UN Security Council resolution critical of Israel from which the Obama administration abstained, Lake writes the following: “Even though the Obama administration had less than a month left in office, the president instructed his ambassador to the United Nations to abstain from a resolution, breaking a precedent that went back to 1980 when it came to one-sided anti-Israel resolutions at the UN.”