For the last time as president, outgoing U.S. President Barack Obama again signed the presidential waiver delaying relocation of the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.
Obama’s signature on Thursday means the issue of relocating the embassy to Israel’s capital will not be raised for at least another six months, despite a campaign promise by President-elect Donald J. Trump to move the embassy to Jerusalem.
The campaign promise is one that has been made before, and waived faithfully every six months by every president since the day Congress passed the law in 1995 recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and mandating transfer of the embassy to the holy city.
Every president has cited “national security” in the presidential waivers signed every six months postponing that move, beginning with Bill Clinton.
That option may no longer be available the next time around, however, if legislation proposed by Republican senators is passed, forcing the president to move the embassy anyway.
The bill proposed earlier this year strikes the language provided in the 1995 Embassy Act to cite “national security” as a reason for delaying the transfer of the American Embassy to Jerusalem.
It may not be an issue anyway: In March, Trump assured AIPAC that would “move the American Embassy to the eternal capital of the Jewish people, Jerusalem.”
As with other promises, he told an interviewer later that month it would happen “fairly quickly.” All things are relative, But the presidential waiver was signed December 1. The next