As presidential candidate, Joe Biden was asked if he would reverse President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and the relocation of the US Embassy to Jerusalem. Biden promised, “I wouldn’t reverse it.”
But candidate Biden also proposed re-opening the US diplomatic mission to the Palestinians in Jerusalem, which had merged with the Jerusalem embassy in 2019.
Now Team Biden is moving forward with the latter initiative. On May 25, Secretary of State Antony Blinken formally told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that Washington would seek to reopen this diplomatic mission. The move contradicts Biden’s campaign promise not to renege on the recognition of Jerusalem, since a pair of missions in the same city undercuts Jerusalem’s status as Israel’s capital. It also breaks the Jerusalem Embassy Act that sought to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem no later than 1999 — a law Biden voted for along with 92 other senators.
The 1995 law states that “Jerusalem should remain an undivided city, in which the rights of every ethnic and religious group are protected. … Jerusalem should be recognized as the capital of the State of Israel.” In 2017, on the 50th anniversary of Jerusalem’s reunification in the Six Day War, the Senate unanimously voted to reaffirm the act and called upon the US to “abide by its provisions.”
Former President Donald Trump fulfilled the will of the American people, as expressed by Congress, by relocating the embassy in 2018. In February 2021, the Senate also adopted an amendment by a 97-3 vote to “make the US Embassy in Jerusalem permanent, effectively preventing it from being downgraded or moved out of Israel’s capital, Jerusalem.”
The Biden administration’s intent to reopen a separate diplomatic mission to the Palestinians in Jerusalem, Israel’s capital and the location of the US Embassy, would be a violation of US law, wrongly signaling that Washington supports dividing Jerusalem.
If implemented, this could signal the return to a misguided diplomatic arrangement, under which the US ambassador to Israel historically lacked jurisdiction over the eastern part of Jerusalem, the West Bank or Gaza. Instead, a US consul general led a separate diplomatic mission to the Palestinians, who had jurisdiction over those geographic areas. The consulate general didn’t even report to the US ambassador to Israel, but directly to the State Department, often sending conflicting reports to DC.
The diplomatic mission included the US consulate general’s official residence, located in the western part of Jerusalem, thus resulting in the US having a diplomatic mission to the Palestinians in Jerusalem, despite that the fact that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital.
The Trump administration’s decision to merge the US diplomatic mission to the Palestinians into the US Embassy in Jerusalem remedied the prior arrangement and implemented a key aspect of the Jerusalem Embassy Act, which requires that the US Embassy in Jerusalem include the ambassador’s official residence.
Reopening this separate diplomatic mission to the Palestinians would therefore render the US government noncompliant with American law. It would also contradict Biden’s campaign promise to keep the US Embassy in Jerusalem, recreate major inefficiencies having two conflicting US diplomatic missions in the same city and revive what was an ideologically pro-Palestinian office in the heart of Israel’s capital.
Then, too, the move would put the US on a diplomatic collision course with Israel, since the Jewish state’s consent is required to reopen the diplomatic mission to the Palestinians. Israel has the right, just like other sovereign countries, to designate its capital and decide which diplomatic missions locate there. Jerusalem has already objected to the request.
Finally, the Biden administration would be shamefully appeasing the Palestinian leadership, accepting its false narrative that relations were hampered when the diplomatic mission merged into the US Embassy in Jerusalem. The reality is that the embassy has a dedicated outreach office through its Palestinian Affairs Unit. It was the Palestinian leadership that chose to boycott the Trump administration.
The Trump administration showed the real path to peace is when America stands unequivocally with Israel. Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle should ensure no diplomatic mission to the Palestinians is reopened in any part of Jerusalem. If the Biden administration moves forward, Congress must prohibit any funding to it and uphold US law.
Mark Meadows served as chief of staff to former President Donald Trump. David Milstein served as special assistant to the US ambassador to Israel.