Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveiled a plaque marking the location of the newest settlement in the Golan Heights today.
The marker proclaims the settlement will be known as “Trump Heights.”
Netanyahu said the name was chosen to thank President Trump for breaking decades of US tradition and recognizing the Golan Heights as part of Israel in March.
Prior to that point, the US observed the international custom of considering it occupied territory.
Trump Heights, called “Ramat Trump” in Hebrew, is a symbol of the airtight alliance that’s developed between the US and Israel.
Trump has repeatedly aligned himself with Netanyahu’s right-wing policy vision for his country and the Middle East.
The new town has yet to be built, but the ceremony marking the name and location of the settlement was conducted with much fanfare by the Israeli government.
Netanyahu called it “a historic day” and praised Trump as a “friend of Israel.”
Israel captured the Golan from Syria in a 1967 war and later annexed and settled it – moves not accepted by most world powers, who deem it to be occupied Syrian territory.
Ongoing hostilities between Israel and Syria, and internal Syrian fighting that drew Iranian-backed auxiliaries to back Damascus and deploy near the Golan, helped Netanyahu make his case for Trump to recognize the Israeli claim of sovereignty.
Netanyahu heads a caretaker government, having failed to form a coalition after an inconclusive national election in April.
The conservative four-term premier must now contest a Sept. 17 re-run vote.
Netanyahu’s center-left rivals ridiculed Sunday’s ceremony.
“Whoever reads the small print on the ‘historic’ resolution understands that it is a dummy-resolution,” tweeted Zvi Hauser, an ex-Netanyahu cabinet secretary now with an opposition party.
The political upheaval appears to have put a spanner in the works of a long-awaited U.S. proposal for Israeli-Palestinian peace.
Trump advisers had predicted the plan would be made public this month, but officials now say that is unlikely to happen until after the September election.