Trump mid-word looking silly at a press conference

Opinion: Trump’s dangerous pledge to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem could spark war

RECOGNISING Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moving the United States Embassy from Tel Aviv to the historic city are just two of a series of swirling events that look certain to plunge an already uncertain region into an even more unknown immediate future.

After a year when the catastrophic and deadly has been played out in those ungoverned countries that surround Israel – Sinai, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon – the heat looks like returning to the age-old question of Palestine’s future.

President Donald Trump is due to make a major address on the Middle East on Thursday morning Australian time when an announcement on the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moving the US Embassy there is expected.

Like almost every US politician running for President, Trump pledged during his campaign he’d do these things but, unlike every one of those politicians who’s come before, he appears set to deliver on this controversial and potentially dangerous promise.

At an event in Washington at the weekend the Israeli ambassador to the US, Ron Dermer, said he expected Trump would make these announcements this week.

Read the full article by Dennis Atkins at the Courier Mail (subscriber only).