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Donald Trump

US President Donald Trump’s recently unveiled National Security Strategy paper does not specifically mention Turkey. Some Turks think this is good, as any mention would likely have been negative. But some think it is bad for Turkish interests because the absence of a mention highlights Turkey’s diminishing political clout in its region. Regardless, the strategy paper has messages for Ankara on several wavelengths.
While he was on the campaign trail, Donald Trump promised to recognize Jerusalem as the Israeli capital and start plans to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. On December 6, 2017, he made good on that promise. Like media elsewhere around the world, Chinese newspapers – which express the positions of the central government in Beijing – had much to say on the matter. The Chinese responses cast light on two areas: Israeli-Chinese relations and Chinese foreign policy towards the greater Middle East.
In a December 6, 2016 telephone conversation, then President-Elect Donald Trump and Czech President Milos Zeman agreed to meet in April 2017 – but the visit appears to have been indefinitely postponed. This is unwise. Zeman, like Trump, is a staunch supporter of Israel, opposes Europe’s “Munich attitude” of appeasement, and is a foe of Islamic terrorists. He should be treated by the White House as the ally he is.
Arab and Muslim leaders hope to stoke sufficient anxiety among world leaders to stop them from following President Trump’s lead in recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. In effect, they hope to ensure that Muslim threats are given veto power over the decisions by world powers on this matter. But the objections to recognition are specious, ahistorical, and hypocritical. All countries should reject Muslim revisionism and join Trump in his action – which is, after all, simply acknowledging a 3,000-years-long reality.
Emmanuel Macron’s presidency heralds no new era in Israel-France relations, particularly on issues relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Like other French presidents before him, he condemns Palestinian terrorism and Israeli settlements in the West Bank as if they are moral equivalents. His response to US President Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital was to reassert the traditional French subscription to the two-state solution and to stress that Paris does not approve of the American move.

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