Investigative journalist David Bedein, the head of the Center for Near East Policy Research,warned that the law requiring the US embassy to be relocated from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem does not recognize Israeli sovereignty over its capital, and that it would be better for Israel if US President Donald Trump signed the Security Waiver delaying the implementation of the law in order to provide time for Congress to fix the problems with the legislation.
“I was in Washington, in the capital, when the law was passed. I watched the negotiation go on, when Faisal Husseini, representing the PLO, and Yossi Beilin, representing the Israeli government, watered down the law. Instead of a law which would recognize the sovereignty over Jerusalem by Israel, but instead just moves the embassy without sovereignty,” Bedein said.
“It goes according to the American law which, number one, doesn’t recognize Jerusalem as part of Israel, and number two, makes [Jerusalem] into a Corpus separatum, separate from Israel. If Trump delays the move of the embassy, that is very good, because it allows for a change in the law,” he said.
He warned that the law “is phrased in such a way that it can allow another embassy to come in here, another capital to come in here, and it does not recognize Jerusalem as part of Israel.”
He called on US citizens to contact their representatives in Congress to amend the law in the coming months to add recognition of Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem to the legislation.