The Trump administration is considering a declaration that’s significant around the world, whether to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

And if the U.S. government does that, it could later move the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel, to the city of Jerusalem.

Here’s why that significant. In 1980, Israel passed a law declaring Jerusalem to be its capital. It had seen the city as that for decades.

But the United Nations said that declaration was against international law because it saw Jerusalem as an international city. Its population of around 850,000 people isn’t particularly large as cities go. But Jerusalem’s importance to the world’s three major Abrahamic religions --

Judaism, Christianity and Islam -- is tremendous.

At one level, it’s a city like any other. People sell, people buy, normal life. But Jerusalem’s old city is special. And this is the best vantage point, here on the Mount of Olives.

The Doom of the Rock, a key holy site for Muslims. Behind it, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, built on the site where many Christians believe Christ was crucified.

And out of sight from this vantage point, the Western Wall, holy to Jews supporting the mount where the temple once stood. It’s not Jerusalem’s significance, that’s in dispute. It’s a status.

After nearly 20 years divided by barbed wire, Israel forces took control of the whole city, east and west. In 1967, the international community did not recognize what Israel called the unification of Jerusalem, embassies stayed in Tel Aviv. And East Jerusalem was accepted by the international community as the capital of a future Palestinian state in a negotiated settlement between Israelis and Palestinians.