Noting the “absurdity” of America’s current policy, Robert Satloff calls on Donald Trump to make good on his campaign promise to relocate the American embassy to Israel’s capital, urges that he announce his intention to do so quickly, and provides detailed advice on how the plan should be executed:

Presidents of both parties who made and then broke [their] promise [to move the embassy] were evidently convinced that [doing so] would ignite such outrage in Arab and Muslim-majority countries and trigger such violence among Palestinians themselves that the costs outweighed the benefits. Opponents of the embassy move have always cited this argument as though it were a self-evident truth. This analysis, however, takes ominous warnings by certain Middle East leaders at face value, builds on what is essentially a condescending view of Arabs and Muslims that assumes they will react mindlessly to incendiary calls to violence, and does not reflect a net assessment that includes the potential impact of subtle, creative, and at times forceful American diplomacy.

Both the residence and embassy should be in west Jerusalem, that part of the city Israel has controlled since 1948–49, to underscore that this move repairs a historic injustice dating to Israel’s founding: that the United States has never formally recognized any part of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. . . .

[But] any assessment of the move . . . needs to place appropriate value not just on repairing a historic injustice but on the powerful signal broadcast to the Middle East—and the wider world—that the new administration is determined to chart a new course in the region, one in which fulfilling commitments to allies is a top priority. . . .

[It will be] useful for the Trump team to point out [to the leaders of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Jordan] that the embassy move reflects something that all these countries should appreciate—a reaffirmation of America’s commitment to allies and its willingness to take bold steps to give meaning to those alliances. More generally, to the extent U.S. envoys can signal a renewed commitment to broader U.S. leadership in the region, the more likely it is that Arab leaders will be willing to use means at their disposal to rein in obstreperous elements in their societies eager to stoke popular outrage at the embassy move.

Robert Satloff has some harsh words for the U.S. government in this regard, words I take especially seriously because Satloff is someone inclined to political moderation. Why, he asks, have American diplomats failed to achieve anything in their endless rounds of talks in Doha and Cairo? Because

there is simply not enough pressure on Hamas to change course, accept a deal, and release the remaining October 7 hostages, stuck in nightmarish captivity. . . . In this environment, why should Hamas change course?

Publicly, the U.S. should bite the bullet and urge Israel to complete the main battle operations in Gaza—i.e., the Rafah operation—as swiftly and efficiently as possible. We should be assertively assisting with the humanitarian side of this.

Satloff had more to say about the hostages, especially the five American ones, in a speech he gave recently:

I am ashamed—ashamed of how we have allowed the story of the hostages to get lost in the noise of the war that followed their capture; ashamed of how we have permitted their release to be a bargaining chip in some larger political negotiation; ashamed of how we have failed to give them the respect and dignity and our wholehearted demand for Red Cross access and care and medicine that is our normal, usual demand for hostages.

If they were taken by Boko Haram, everyone would know their name. If they were taken by the Taliban, everyone would tie a yellow ribbon around a tree for them. If they were taken by Islamic State, kids would learn about them in school.

It is repugnant to see their freedom as just one item on the bargaining table with Hamas, as though they were chattel. These are Americans—and they deserve to be backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.