Likely Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said on Saturday he will move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem if he is elected to the White House in 2016.
Asked by reporters if Jerusalem should be Israel’s capital “forever,” Bush said:
I support that, absolutely. I also support moving the embassy to Jerusalem as well — our embassy. Not just as a symbol but a show of solidarity
However, there is little connection between promises to move the embassy to Jerusalem and actually doing so. Bill Clinton assured voters he would do so, but didn’t. George W. Bush promised to do so, and didn’t. And Mitt Romney, in the 2012 presidential election, promised to do so, and he lost.
The White House for years has followed the State Dept. policy that moving the American embassy to the capital of Israel would endanger American national security. It indeed would endanger the dream of the Arab world to eliminate a Jewish Israel by planting a Palestinian Authority flag on the Temple Mount in its never-never world of a new Arab state within Israel’s current borders and encompassing the Old City of Jerusalem.
The reasoning in Foggy Bottom must be that since moving the embassy would upset the Arabs, they might turn off the oil spigot, raising the price of oil and causing a recession in the United States. That would mean higher unemployment and a recession, creating grounds for a social protest that would allow the Islamic State (ISIS) to recruit more terrorist to take over the country.
Perhaps that is why Congress’ Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995, which states that the embassy must be moved to Jerusalem, has a waiver that states:
The president may suspend the limitations set forth in section 3(b) for a period of six months if he determines and reports to Congress in advance that such suspension is necessary to protect the national security interests of the United States.
The President may suspend such limitations for an additional six month period at the end of any period during which the suspension is in effect under this subsections if the President determines and reports to Congress in advance of the additional suspension that the additional suspension is necessary to protect the national security interests of the United States.
Every American president, Democrat and Republican alike, has exercised the waiver every six months.
But the United States is becoming energy self-sufficient and less dependent on Arab oil, so the theory of national security being endangered by the high price of oil doesn’t hold much water.
Perhaps President Barack Obama is worried that moving the embassy would upset his proposed deal with Iran to supposedly oversee its nuclear development, and “no deal” would infuriate Iran into building a nuclear bomb to threat Washington.
Or perhaps moving the embassy would set off riots in Baltimore.
No matter what theory you come up with, the foreign policy non-thinkers in Washington will guarantee that moving the embassy endangers the citizens in Oskosh.
Doesn’t Jeb Bush care about the folks in Oskosh?