UNITED States President Donald Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital does not represent only a “kiss of death” to the two-state solution, but also a strong blow to the face of 57 Muslim countries, not to mention igniting fire in this inflammable region, providing more false arguments to criminal terrorist groups to escalate their brutal attacks, in addition to taking a step further in Washington’s new conflict with Iran and the “restructuring” of the Middle East.
These are the main conclusions reached by both Middle East analysts and international policy experts as soon as Trump announced on Dec 6, his decision to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, thus recognising as capital of Israel this Holy City, home to essential shrines of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
The Old City of Jerusalem has been steadily considered by Palestinians as the capital of their future state, should all international groups, including the United Nations General Assembly, implement their commitment to the two-state solution, one Israeli and one Palestinian.
Israelis captured Arab East Jerusalem from Jordan in the 1967 Middle East war. The Old City in Jerusalem hosts the Al Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam after Mecca and Medina.
Palestinian leaders have warned that Trump’s move could have dangerous consequences, calling for massive popular mobilisations that are feared will lead to new bloodshed in the occupied West Bank and Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.
“This is much more than a kiss of death to the longstanding international consensus to establish two states as the sole feasible solution,” a former Egyptian high-ranking military official said on condition of anonymity.
“Trump’s decision will add more dangerous fuel to the rekindled flame over the hegemony dispute between the Shias led by Iran and Sunnis led by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf States.”
According to the retired military official, who participated in secret regional negotiations over the Middle East conflict: “US has visibly shown its strategy to support the Sunni states in the Arab Gulf… Just see Trump’s new weapons sale deal — worth US$100 billion (RM408 billion) — with the Saudi government, and its tacit support — and even physical involvement — in the ongoing war in Yemen.”
Gulf Sunni Arab countries are home to a high percentage of Shias, who have been systematically ruled by Sunni regimes. In some of them, like Bahrain, it is estimated that the Shias represent up to 60 per cent of the population, but they are considered minorities.
The Egyptian analyst would not exclude a new armed conflict between the Gulf Arab Sunni states and Shia Iran. Such an armed conflict would break the already fragile stability in the region, leading to a strong rise in oil prices.
“This would benefit the US fossil energy sector, weaken the oil-dependent European economies and strike a strong blow to the also foreign oil-dependent China.”
Another immediate, dangerous consequence of Trump’s decision is a feared new wave of terrorist attacks on US, Israel and Western interests worldwide.
In fact, Hamas has urged Arabs and Muslims worldwide to “undermine US interests in the region” and to “shun Israel”.
On this, Lebanese Shia ulama A. Khalil expressed his “deep fear that the decision will help criminal terrorist groups, falsely acting in the name of Islam, to exploit the furious anger of laypeople against US-led aggression against Muslims in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen… to commit more and more brutal, inhumane attacks”.
This would tragically and dangerously unleash a new wave of hatred and Islamophobia that would only add fuel to popular anger, to the benefit of terrorist groups, Khalil added.
For his part, Ahmed El-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Egypt’s Al-Azhar — which is considered the world’s highest institution of Sunni Islamic learning — announced on Dec 5 that Al-Azhar rejects Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
“The US president’s decision denies the rights of Palestinians and Arabs to their holy city; it ignores the feelings of 1½ billion Muslims as well as millions of Arab Christians who have a connection to Jerusalem’s churches and monasteries,” he said.
Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church and Al-Azhar issued statements warning of the “serious potential consequences” of Trump’s plan to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and to relocate the US embassy there.
Will words and “politically correct” statements reverse this new situation? Most likely they will not, at least if you judge by what’s happened over the last 98 years, i.e. since the then British empire released its 1919 Balfour Declaration granting Israel a national home in Palestine. -- IPS