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Title: Tillerson, Mattis Warned Trump Against Embassy Move
Source: [None]
URL Source: http://www.theamericanconservative. ... y-move-trump-jerusalem-israel/
Published: Dec 7, 2017
Author: MARK PERRY
Post Date: 2017-12-07 07:23:03 by Ada
Keywords: None
Views: 1166
Comments: 18

President insisted on his Jerusalem moment, but the impact will be forever.

President visit the Western Wall, Jerusalem, May 22, 2017. Credit: Photo credit: Matty Stern/U.S. Embassy Tel Aviv. Donald Trump’s announcement that the U.S. now recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and will eventually move its embassy there, might well be the most predictable decision of an otherwise unpredictable presidency.

Trump made his Jerusalem promise back in March of 2016, during an address he gave to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). It was an obvious attempt to convince skeptical Jewish leaders of his uncompromising support for Israel.

But it’s not only that Trump was intent to fulfill a campaign promise: The Jerusalem initiative has been in the works since the day he took office, was coordinated with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and is supported by influential voices in the administration—including Vice President Mike Pence, son-in-law Jared Kushner, Middle East envoy (and former Trump Organization lawyer) Jason Greenblatt, and CIA Director Mike Pompeo. The decision was all but finalized, The American Conservative has learned, during a late November meeting of Trump’s foreign policy advisors at the White House.

The November confab was well underway when Trump arrived to press his case. While the president was only expected to stay in the meeting for 15 to 20 minutes, he ended up staying for a full hour. Trump, TAC was told by a senior Pentagon officer with knowledge of the meeting, was adamant about keeping his campaign pledge, but was brought up short by warnings issued by Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Both officials argued that the move would endanger American diplomats serving in the region, undermine the administration’s efforts to revive the Israeli- Palestinian peace process, and result in condemnations from both Arab countries and America’s most important allies in Europe. Trump could expect almost no support in the international community, they said. America would “have to go it alone.”

Trump listened closely to the warnings over the next hour (“it was a very intense exchange,” TAC was told by the senior Pentagon official, “but it certainly wasn’t heated”). But at the end of the discussion the president said that he would go ahead with his decision despite the difficulties it might cause. He also acknowledged concerns about possible threats to U.S. diplomats, and said that he would dampen them by repeating U.S. assurances that it was committed to a two-state solution. Moreso, he argued, the U.S. did not need to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem immediately— which would serve as a further reassurance.

Even so, Wednesday’s announcement about Jerusalem was tortured by a number of inherent contradictions, including the most prominent of all—the contention that the decision was not only in the “best interests of the United States,” but would actually enhance the prospects of a two-state solution and energize the peace process. “We are not taking a position on any final status issues,” Trump added, “including the specific boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem or the resolution of contested borders. Those questions are up to the parties involved.” The decision is “in the best interests of the United States of America and the pursuit of peace between Israel and the Palestinians.”

In fact, it seems unlikely that this unseemly sleight-of-hand (of making dubious claims), will allay Arab fears that the U.S. continues to be “Israel’s lawyer” (to use a term coined by former U.S. Middle East negotiator Aaron David Miller). Now it has also become Israel’s realtor. This seems not to bother the president, who is becoming known for playing a poor hand by throwing in more chips.

The strategy is almost perverse in its beauty, and was on full display among administration officials intent on selling the president’s Jerusalem initiative in the wake of his address. The Trump announcement, as one of them argued, doesn’t undermine the peace process—not because there isn’t one (as everyone suspects), but because there is, and it’s going swimmingly. Trump, this official added, was actually anxious to make Wednesday’s announcement because he was so encouraged by the progress made on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process by Jared Kushner and his team. “I know a lot of that progress isn’t visible,” as this official was overheard saying to a prominent television reporter, “[but] it’s partly because that progress is not visible that they’ve been able to make so much progress.”

Domestically, it would seem Trump has little to worry about. The Democrats have spent the last 70 years (since 1948), fawning over Israel and defending it, while the Republicans’ Christian Evangelical base is in full-throated support of the embassy move. Furthermore, the GOP has been desperate to break into what was once a Democrat-only monopoly on Jewish-American political funding—and Jewish votes. In this sense, Mr. Trump’s Jerusalem announcement can be seen as a kind of coming out party—a celebration that the monopoly has been broken, that the Republicans have arrived. Then too, the bedrock of progressivism of American Jews (who supported any number of progressive movements over the last decades), has been overawed by concern that Israel can best be defended by backing pro-military conservative interventionists.

And so it is that President Trump’s Jerusalem announcement might well be seen as a significant and decisive victory—for Israel, for the Republican Party, and for those Jewish Americans who have had to choose between their progressive ideals and their support for a nation that is anything but. The result is stark, discomforting. It may be that the controversy will fade, that the Arab world will remain quiet, that the Trump administration will use the Jerusalem decision as a springboard to launch a creative and fair resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That Jared Kushner will succeed where George Mitchell did not. But that doesn’t seem likely.

Rather, it’s probable that the governments of Europe will remember the real import of this decision—that when asked to stand with our European allies and Arab friends, we chose Israel instead.

Pay attention: This is what it feels like to live in a nation whose moment has passed.

Mark Perry is a foreign policy analyst, a regular contributor to The American Conservative and the author of The Pentagon’s Wars, which was released in October. He tweets @markperrydc

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#1. To: Ada (#0)

Obvious to even those of us that are unqualified observers , this country would have been in excellent health had Clinton won.

The world would be basking in tranquility.

Cynicom  posted on  2017-12-07   8:08:27 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: Ada (#0)

On the face of it, a bad move, but maybe Trump has some diplomatic tricks up his sleeve. He's throwing Israel a big bone with this. He should be getting a big bone back from them in return, like approval from Israel for a two state solution or a reversal on illegal settlement activity.

Pinguinite  posted on  2017-12-07   8:38:23 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: Cynicom (#1)

As a certified unqualified observer, I'd say all alternate realities I know of are at least as ugly as the one I'm living in.

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded. - James Madison

randge  posted on  2017-12-07   8:51:30 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#4. To: Ada (#0)

This move is Tramp, sorry Trump, flipping off the middle east and poking the bear for war, doing what jew land tell him'

Darkwing  posted on  2017-12-07   9:46:38 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#5. To: randge (#3)

On the internet, one may view pages of entries by Harry Truman in his diary.

All short, cryptic, to the point. He was the man that created Israel out of nothing

Truman..."NO matter what you do for the jews, it is never enough"....

Cynicom  posted on  2017-12-07   10:33:55 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#6. To: Ada (#0)

Maybe Trump is tired of the pussy footing around and wants to call the Islamists out. I'm all for it. Maybe Trump wants to eliminate any further invasion of the U.S. by the Islamic rapists. I'm all for it.

Ephesians 5:11King James Version (KJV)

11 "And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. "

noone222  posted on  2017-12-07   11:18:25 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#7. To: randge (#3)

As a certified unqualified observer, I'd say all alternate realities I know of are at least as ugly as the one I'm living in.

Agreed !

Ephesians 5:11King James Version (KJV)

11 "And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. "

noone222  posted on  2017-12-07   11:19:01 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#8. To: Cynicom (#5)

Truman..."NO matter what you do for the jews, it is never enough"....

Spot on. Everyone in the world has given them a shot and they have a 100% perfect record of fucking it up !

Ephesians 5:11King James Version (KJV)

11 "And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. "

noone222  posted on  2017-12-07   11:20:21 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#9. To: noone222 (#8)

Personal experience way back, during the Great Depression, in the hills, far from civilization.

One of the first ODD words I recall was the term "jew" attached to certain men in our small town.

With 99.9 white, Christian population, they were an abnormality. They owned all the retail stores, they were never seen anywhere else, at any time. Never were they a party of the community, their disdain for all others was palatable.

When big box stores opened, they all vanished. Now we have none. They are never a part of any town, city, state or country.

Cynicom  posted on  2017-12-07   11:45:56 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#10. To: Cynicom (#9)

They are never a part of any town, city, state or country.

I have only known a few personally and they were connected to my occupation. They were not sociable to a very large extent. I worked with one that was sociable and attended social functions related to work, but not so otherwise.

Ephesians 5:11King James Version (KJV)

11 "And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. "

noone222  posted on  2017-12-07   16:27:58 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#11. To: noone222, Cynicom, 4 (#10)

Someone advised us that the jew should never be allowed in education, banking, or government; I believe that someone was correct.

“The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out... without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, intolerable.” ~ H. L. Mencken

Lod  posted on  2017-12-07   16:53:31 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#12. To: Lod (#11)

jew should never be allowed in education, banking, or government;

Look in your phone book for your local jew plumber to come fix your furnace?

Physical and or hand dirtying effort is an anathema to jews.

Cynicom  posted on  2017-12-07   17:14:19 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#13. To: Ada (#0)

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." -- Samuel Adams (1722-1803)‡

"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." -- Thomas Jefferson

ghostdogtxn  posted on  2017-12-07   18:07:19 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#14. To: Cynicom (#1)

now we see make america great again requires appease the jews first then maybe get on to putting the clinton behind bars


I used to be in a hurry, then I figured out I was just getting nowhere fast.

IRTorqued  posted on  2017-12-07   18:24:13 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#15. To: Cynicom (#12)

Physical and or hand dirtying effort is an anathema to jews.

I have nothing to dispute that, nothing at all.

“The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out... without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, intolerable.” ~ H. L. Mencken

Lod  posted on  2017-12-07   18:25:51 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#16. To: Ada (#0)

Zionists lost big time in Syria; need some cheering up.

Tatarewicz  posted on  2017-12-08   0:24:21 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#17. To: Cynicom (#12)

Look in your phone book for your local jew plumber to come fix your furnace?

"Even Jake the Plumber, the man I adore Has the noive to tell me he's been married before" - Second Hand Rose

Ada  posted on  2017-12-08   9:11:14 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#18. To: Tatarewicz (#16)

Zionists lost big time in Syria; need some cheering up.

So did the US but can't admit it.

Ada  posted on  2017-12-08   9:13:46 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


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