Jerusalem, the City of Peace, has been the Jewish capital, arguably, since before the word Jew meant anything specific. When Solomon built his temple, the Old Testament–as people raised in my own tradition call it–had not been completed. I forget what the Jews call it. I believe it is the Mishnah.
For their own purposes, the Israelis have long claimed Jerusalem, in the modern era, as their capital.
Thus, as many commentators have pointed out, including Nicki Haley (who I love), Trump has done nothing more or less than ratify publicly the existing status quo.
And here of course is the problem. The Arab world, in a sustained fit of magical thinking which would put even today’s Never Trumpers to shame, does not want to accept this step because it ratifies the existence of the Jewish state, which they STILL reject 70 years later.
Now, one can reasonably ask how it is possible to conceive this, that a highly successful, vastly more militarily powerful nation could just up and vanish, just stop being, so that lazy, ignorant, and emotionally retarded people could just march in and proclaim it reclaimed for Islam and the greater Arab world.
It is ludicrous, farcical. Israel would destroy most of the Middle East before it would allow itself to be conquered by anyone.
But the thinking around this has not evolved at all in far too many minds in 7 decades, 7 decades in which the children of refugees lived their lives in tents, fed by charity, and unable to find work or anything like a productive, dignified life, all so that ugly minds could continue to nurture ludicrous and ugly dreams.
Often, the first step in needed change is the speaking aloud, in public, of clear and obvious, but unwanted truths. Trump has done that.