Jerusalem Is and Always Will Be Treated as a “Special” Case

Eugene Kontorovich, Jeremy A. Rabkin, and Douglas J. Feith were kind enough not only to read my essay, “The Mirage of an International Jerusalem,” but to contribute their own acute reflections on the subject.

This is rewarding in itself. Even more rewarding is that they broadly agree with me on the main point: namely, that where Israel and Jerusalem are concerned, what passes for international law amounts, by the standards that usually apply to other nations and capital cities, either to sheer nonsense or to travesty; and that in all these respects President Trump and his administration should be unrestrictedly praised for replacing nonsense and travesty with realism and sanity.

I derive additional satisfaction from my respondents’ interest in the historical evidence supporting my contentions, from the long-term demographic presence of a Jewish plurality or majority in Jerusalem to the pervasive if often contradictory role of the Holy See right before and right after Israel’s War of Independence in 1948.