The United States announced Friday that it plans to relocate its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in May, to coincide with Israel's 70th anniversary.
The move, which the U.S. State Department called a "historic step," follows President Donald Trump's Dec. 6 decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
Trump's announcement reversed decades of U.S. policy, delighting Israel's government but dismaying Palestinians, who want the eastern part of the city as the capital of their future state. It also drew criticism from some U.S. allies in the region.
The proposed timeline is quicker than many expected. In January, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence told the Knesset only that the move would happen before the end of next year.
On Friday, a State Department spokeswoman said that in May the U.S. ambassador and a small staff would begin operating an "interim embassy" from a building in the Arnona neighborhood of Jerusalem that currently houses U.S. consular operations. She said the search had already begun for a permanent embassy site in Jerusalem.
Questions have been raised as to what brought about Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital and to announce the embassy move.
Pro-Israel politicians in Washington have long exerted pressure to move the embassy, and Trump made it a promise of his 2016 election campaign.
Pence and Trump-appointed U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman are thought to have pushed hard for both the recognition and the embassy relocation. The decision is popular with the many conservative and evangelical Christians who voted for Trump and Pence. Many of them support political recognition of Israel's claim to the city.
Jerusalem is a city sacred to Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and each religion has sites of great significance there. Muslims call it Al-Quds, "The Holy."
In the heart of the Old City is the hill known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif, "the Noble Sanctuary." There lie the ruins of the ancient Jewish Temples, with only retaining wall built by Herod the Great, the Western Wall, remaining above ground. The Western Wall is a sacred place of prayer for Jews. Overlooking it are the Muslim holy places the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa Mosque, built in the eighth century, considered the third-holiest site in Islam, after Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia. The city is also an important pilgrimage site for Christians, who revere it as the place where they believe that Jesus Christ preached, died and was resurrected.
While no one disputes the city's ancient importance, it is its modern status that is one of the core issues at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Israel's government regards Jerusalem as the eternal and indivisible capital of the country, although that is not recognized internationally. Palestinians feel equally strongly, saying east Jerusalem must be the capital of a future Palestinian state.
In 1947, the U.N. General Assembly decided that British-ruled Palestine should be partitioned into an Arab state and a Jewish state. But it recognized that Jerusalem had special status and proposed international rule for the city, along with nearby Bethlehem, as a "corpus separatum" to be administered by the United Nations.
That never happened. When British rule ended in 1948, Jordanian forces occupied the Old City and Arab east Jerusalem. Israel liberated east Jerusalem from Jordan in the 1967 Six-Day War and annexed it in a move not recognized internationally.
In 1980, Israel passed the Basic Law: Jerusalem, Capital of Israel, declaring the "complete and united" city of Jerusalem to be the country's capital. But the United Nations regards east Jerusalem as occupied and the city's status as disputed until resolved by negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Jordan's King Abdullah retains a role in ensuring the upkeep of the Muslim holy places.
Other countries have had embassies in Jerusalem in the past, but moved them out some years ago. In December, Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales said his country would move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem too. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said several countries were considering following the U.S. lead, but he declined to identify them.
In December, 128 countries voted in a nonbinding U.N. General Assembly resolution calling on the U.S. to drop its recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Nine voted against, 35 abstained, and 21 did not cast a vote.
Since the American announcement, there has been tension, with Palestinian protests in Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.
Although clashes between Palestinian protesters and Israeli forces have not been on the scale of the first and second Palestinian intifadas in 1987-1993 and 2000-2005, violence has erupted before over matters of sovereignty and religion.
In 2000, then Opposition Leader Ariel Sharon led a group of Israeli lawmakers onto the Temple Mount complex. Palestinians protested, and violent clashes quickly escalated into the second Palestinian uprising, also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada.
Deadly confrontations also took place last July after Israel installed metal detectors at the entrance to the complex following the murder of two Israeli policemen there by Arab-Israeli gunmen.
Arab leaders across the Middle East have warned that a unilateral U.S. move could lead to turmoil and hamper U.S. efforts to restart the long-stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
