Donald Trump formally recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and orders the State Department to relocate the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. The move is considered widely controversial as both Israelis and Palestinians claim Jerusalem.
Relocating the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem has been one of Sheldon Adelson’s biggest political missions, and Trump made it possible thanks to donors like him.
Adelson donated more than any other person to Trump’s 2016 election campaign, and then he donated $5 million to Trump’s inaugural committee. That’s the largest contribution to any inauguration in U.S. history.
The mega-donor helped Trump in other ways, too. In December 2015, Adelson used a shell company to buy the Las Vegas Review-Journal newspaper. Just months later, the Review-Journal became the only major U.S. publication to endorse Donald Trump for president.
Israel is such an important issue for Adelson that he owns a home and news outlets in the country. He is a big supporter of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a Kushner family friend. He is also in favor of Israel’s territorial expansion and assaults on Palestine, and he’s known to work closely with U.S. lawmakers who share his views.
Adelson is involved so closely in the Trump campaign and Israeli affairs that he even pre-reviewed a pro-Israel Trump speech written by Jared Kushner in March 2016.
In 2020, after the U.S. Embassy is moved, Adelson spends $67.7 million to buy the former U.S. ambassador’s residence in Tel Aviv.
It was the largest amount paid for a home in Israeli history and appeared aimed at making it more difficult for future presidents to reverse the Trump administration’s move of the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem in 2018.
The New York Times
Like Trump, Adelson and his businesses have documented ties to organized crime and Chinese mafia organizations. Adelson has even been accused of single-handedly expanding prostitution in China.
Before the Trump era, Adelson built the world’s largest empire of casinos and resort hotels in Las Vegas and around the world, landing him in a top 10 list of the wealthiest people in the world before his death in 2021.
The move from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem is completed in May 2018. Despite obvious political and financial motives, Trump’s evangelical base believes he fulfilled biblical prophecy. He later tells them that was his goal.
Sources
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/12/business/sheldon-adelson-dead.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/14/us/politics/trump-jerusalem-embassy-middle-east-peace.html
https://www.veteranstoday.com/2019/12/10/trump-dear-america-i-worked-for-a-gangster-sheldon-adelson/
https://www.rawstory.com/2015/05/sheldon-adelsons-ties-to-alleged-chinese-crime-boss-under-scrutiny-after-new-testimony/
https://pjmedia.com/faith/tyler-o-neil/2018/05/23/no-trump-did-not-move-the-embassy-to-jerusalem-to-fulfill-bible-prophecy-n101772
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/israel/2020/august/trump-says-he-moved-nbsp-us-embassy-to-jerusalem-lsquo-for-the-evangelicals-rsquo
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