Jay Sekulow - Jerusalem: A Biblical and Historical Case for the Jewish Capital

This book is about the history of Israel. I had no idea when I started writing it, though, that this would be one of the most important and historic years in Israels long history. Soon after I completed the first draft of this book, something wonderful happened: President Donald J. Trump announced that the United States would move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and officially recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Of course, the Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995, which easily passed the House and the Senate, called for both these things more than twenty years ago. However, Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama all kicked the can down the road every time they had a chance to put the resolution into effect. Those delays came to an end in December 2017, when President Trump finally took action on this important piece of legislation.

I was personally and tremendously touched on many levels that day. I have the honor of serving as Counsel to the 45th President of the United States, and I was in Washington with the president on the very day he announced the historic recognition of Jerusalem as Israels Capital. My entire family, including my grandchildren, were with me. We were able to spend time with the president, and I told him how proud we all were for what he had done. It was a day we will never forget. And now, as this book goes to print, the U.S. Embassy has been relocated to Jerusalem. We are truly living history.

The December 2017 decision should not have been a surprise. Just six months earlier, in June of that year, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed a resolution reaffirming the Act and calling on the President to abide by all its provisions. And yet, when President Trump did just that, the world erupted into a panic. World leaders, the United Nations, news media, and even U.S. senators who had reaffirmed the Act months earlier now criticized and attacked the president. These criticisms were devoid of any factual basis, and the unbelievable cognitive dissonance of some legislators became painfully apparent. They showed themselves to be friends with Israel and supporters of her rights in theory but certainly not in practice. This kind of disagreement and duplicity shows why a book like this is absolutely necessarynow more than ever.

This will kill the two-state plan, they screamed from Europe. This will result in violence, they yelled from around the Middle East. Oslo accords are dead, proclaimed Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Palestinian Authority. And yet, for all this blustering, what actually happened? Thanks to Gods good grace, absolutely nothing. President Trump was right. Standing up for Israels rightsnot to mention the United States right to have our embassy where we want itdid not lead to massive riots. As significant as the recognition of Israel has been for the Israeli people, it has effectively changed nothing for the rest of the world. Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Jordan have all continued to develop and even expand inroads made unilaterally with Israel in terms of diplomatic and economic projects. Even now, the development of NEOM, a technologically advanced city on the coast of Saudi Arabia, may serve as one of the strongest bonds between countries in the area. On the other side of the Suez, Egypt and Israel have continued to work together on shared security concerns, such as those posed by Hamas in the Gaza Strip and ISIS in the Sinai. On the Friday following the announcement, Jews were able to pray at the Western Wall, Muslims continued to pray at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and life continued as normal.

This begs the question: If nothing really changed, why was this such a momentous occasion? First, there is the history. All throughout Israel, archaeological digs have turned up artifacts showing connections between the land and the Jewish people. Just a few weeks before I sat down to write this preface, Israel discovered the seal of the prophet Isaiah in Jerusalem, right near the Temple Mount. It was Isaiah, of course, who prophesied that the Jewish people would one day regain sovereignty over that very mountain and that the nations of the world would bear witness. To say the Temple Mount and its Western Wall have no historical significance to the Jews (a claim that has been repeated endlessly by Israels detractors) is simply absurdand its way past time the world stopped trading in these absurdities.