US COURT RULES IN FAVOR OF PRESIDENT BEING THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN DETERMINE JERUSALEM-BORN CITIZENS' RIGHT TO LIST ISRAEL AS NATIONALITY

The court that was overseeing the case of the Zivotofsky family's lawsuit to get Israel listed as their son's birthplace on his passport has invalidated the law from 2002 that was never enforced:

A federal appeals court on Tuesday invalidated a U.S. law that was designed to allow American citizens born in Jerusalem to choose to have Israel listed as their birthplace on passports contrary to long-standing U.S. foreign policy.

Ari and Naomi Zivotofsky, whose son Menachem was born in Jerusalem and is a U.S. citizen, filed a lawsuit in 2003 demanding that the government enforce the law.

A unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that the president - and not lawmakers - had sole authority to say who controls the historic holy city claimed by Israelis and Palestinians.

In the U.S. government, the president "exclusively holds the power to determine whether to recognize a foreign sovereign," wrote Judge Karen Henderson for the panel. [...]

Lawyers for Zivotofsky said they would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court, as they did following the 2009 ruling.

“We hope that before Menachem Binyamin Zivotofsky’s bar mitzvah, he will be able to bear a passport that recognizes his birthplace as ‘Israel,’ ”attorneys Nathan and Alyza Lewin said in a statement.

This is nothing more than a pathetic ruling in Obama's favor, not to mention many anti-Israelists who try to delegitimize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. It makes no sense and is offensive, because the judge was basically delegitimizing both Congress and Israel's own sovereignty. I'm glad the family will be appealing this latest ruling, and Congress should too.