an American superpower attempting to balance influence against other competing interests in the region, namely those of Russia and its allies. Some analysts maintain that Israel is a strategic ally for the United States, and that relations with the former will strengthen the latter's influence in the Middle East. Israel is designated by the United States as a major non-NATO ally, and was the first country to be granted this status alongside Egypt in 1987; Israel and Egypt remain the only countries in the Middle East to have this designation. Then senator Jesse Helms, argued that the military foothold offered by Israel in the region alone justified the expense of American military aid; referring to Israel as "America's aircraft carrier in the Middle East". , the United States remains the only permanent member of the United Nations Security Council to have recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and moved its embassy to the disputed city from Tel Aviv in 2018. The United States is also the only country to have recognized the Golan Heights (designated as Israeli-occupied Syrian territory by the United Nations) as non-occupied Israeli sovereign territory, doing so via a presidential proclamation under the Trump administration in 2019. However, under the subsequent Biden administration, the U.S. State Department’s annual report on human rights violations around the world once more refers to the West Bank, Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights as territories that are occupied by Israel. Nevertheless, in June 2021, in response to a claim by The Washington Free Beacon that it had "walked back" its recognition, the Near Eastern Affairs account of the U.S. State Department tweeted that "U.S. policy regarding the Golan has not changed, and reports to the contrary are false." History Support for Zionism among American Jews was minimal, until the involvement of Louis Brandeis in the Federation of American Zionists, starting in 1912 and the establishment of the Provisional Executive Committee for General Zionist Affairs in 1914; it was empowered by the Zionist Organization "to deal with all Zionist matters, until better times come". Woodrow Wilson, who was sympathetic to the plight of Jews in Europe and favorable to Zionist objectives (giving his assent to the text of the Balfour Declaration shortly before its release) stated on March 2, 1919, "I am persuaded that the Allied nations with the fullest concurrence of our own Government and people are agreed