Ongoing debate about moving the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem is surrounded by misinformation.

One common mistake suggests that the whole city is historically disputed territory between Israelis and Palestinians. That’s not true of Western Jerusalem, built up by returning Jews over the last 150 years, where the bulk of the city’s population lives and all Israeli government buildings are located.  Any new American embassy would also be built there.

In 1948’s War of Independence, Arab fighters seized only East Jerusalem, destroying Jewish neighborhoods that had flourished for over a thousand years, while slaughtering or expelling all Jewish residents.

Even before Israelis re-captured East Jerusalem in 1967, no portion of the city ever served as a Palestinian capital—or even a provincial capital for any Arab rulers. By contrast, Jerusalem has served as the ancient Jewish capital for more than 1,000 years, and Israel’s sole center of government ever since rebirth of the modern Jewish state 69 years ago.