Claim: United States President Donald Trump vowed to build the Third Temple in Jerusalem.
Fact: In the video, Rabbi David Katz only expressed hope for the construction of the temple. He did not state that the Trump administration has vowed to build the Third Temple in Jerusalem or that it would definitely be built.
Moreover, there is no evidence to substantiate the claim that Trump has made such a promise.
On 16 April 2025, a Facebook user posted a video of a person, who appeared to be a Rabbi, giving a speech and then shaking hands with US President Donald Trump on a podium. In the video, the person says the following in English:
“We’ll see the building of the Third Temple in Jerusalem very soon. And we honor our President Trump for what he has done for Jerusalem and the Jewish people.”
The post was accompanied by a caption in Urdu:
صدر ٹرمپ تیسرے ہیکل سلیمانی کی تعمیر کےلیے یہودیوں سے وعدہ کرچکا ہے لوگ ابھی بھی نہیں سمجھ رہے کہ اصل مسئلہ فلسطین وطن کی جنگ نہیں بلکہ کفر اور اسلام کی جنگ ہے یقین جانیئے وقت آپ کی سوچ سے بھی قریب ترین ہمیں ان لمحات کی طرف لےکر بڑھ رہا ہے جو ہمارے وہم و گمان میں بھی نہیں ہیں
ہیکل سلیمانی کی تعمیر مطلب مسجداقصی کی شہادت،مسجد اقصی کی شہادت مطلب وہی خوفناک جنگ جس کا ذکر ہرآسمانی کتاب میں موجودہے
This translates into English as follows:
“President Trump has promised the Jews to build the third temple. People still do not understand that the real issue is not the war for Palestine, but the war between infidelity and Islam. Believe me, time is moving closer than you think, taking us to moments that are beyond our imagination. The construction of the temple means the martyrdom of the al-Aqsa Mosque. The martyrdom of the al-Aqsa Mosque means the same terrible war that is mentioned in every heavenly book.”
Fact or Fiction?
We noticed that the voice of the Rabbi did not align with his lip movements after 0:12 in the video in the claim, raising suspicions about its credibility. Therefore, a reverse-image search of the video’s keyframes was conducted to ascertain its authenticity. This revealed that the video had been shared as early as 16 July 2023 on two news websites: Israel National News – Arutz Sheva and Noticias de Israel.
Regarding the context of the video, both websites claimed it showed Rabbi David Katz, the Executive Director of the Israel Heritage Foundation (IHF), speaking at “the foundation’s gala with former U.S. President Donald Trump”.
Searching for the “Israel Heritage Foundation (IHF)” on Google showed us it is an organization based in the United States that describes itself as “America’s Preeminent Bipartisan Pro-Israel Organization”. Their ‘About Us’ page also showed that Rabbi Katz resides in Brooklyn, New York.
By searching for “Rabbi Katz Donald Trump 2023”, we were led to an article about the event by Jewish News Syndicate (JNS) that stated the event took place at the “Trump National Golf Club Bedminster, in New Jersey” on 10 July 2023. This was confirmed by a video on YouTube by the Israel Heritage Foundation (IHF) that recorded the event.
In this full version of the video, Rabbi Katz starts by talking about the period of the Jewish calendar they are currently in and how it marks the three weeks of mourning for the destruction of the Holy Temple that “happened thousands of years ago”. At 11:13, he says:
“…and when it comes the big day of Tisha B’Av, we cry and we have the great beliefs that very soon we will be zoykhe, we will all see the building of the Third Temple in Jerusalem very soon.”
This statement carried two unfamiliar Hebrew terms, so we conducted Google searches for both “Tisha B’Av” and “zoykhe”. The former denotes an “annual fast day in Judaism” and is a commemoration of the destruction of the two Holy Temples. The latter means to “have the privilege to” or “to live to see”.
Katz’s tone was reflective of the hope for the rebuilding of the Third Temple and the Jewish people living to see it rebuilt. Both news articles by Israel National News – Arutz Sheva and Noticias de Israel also reiterated this as follows.
“He [Katz] further expressed hope for the rebuilding of the Third Temple in Jerusalem, stating, “We have the great beliefs that very soon we will all see the building of the Third Temple in Jerusalem very soon.””
“He [Katz] further expressed his hope for the rebuilding of the Third Temple in Jerusalem , stating, “We have a great belief that very soon we will all see the construction of the Third Temple in Jerusalem.””
We also searched for any official statement from the US State Department or Trump himself about the definite construction of the Third Temple on their respective X accounts. However, no relevant statements came up. Google searches for “Trump Third Temple Jerusalem” and “Trump vows Third Temple Jerusalem” were conducted. While this did not yield any results for the Trump administration officially vowing to build a Third Temple in Jerusalem, we did come across reports of Pete Hegseth, the current US Secretary of Defense, speaking at an event in Jerusalem in 2018. Middle East Eye, JNS, and The Times of Israel reported him as stating that “There’s no reason why the miracle of the re-establishment of the temple on the Temple Mount is not possible”. Hegseth can be seen making this statement in a video by The Times of Israel as well. However, in this instance too Hegseth was only expressing hope for its rebuilding, as he immediately follows it up with:
“I don’t know how it would happen. You don’t know how it would happen, but I know that it could happen”.
It is also important to note that, in 2018, Hegseth was not yet part of the Trump administration. His nomination for Secretary of Defense came in 2024. Hence, the instance of him speaking in Jerusalem cannot qualify as the Trump administration promising to build the Third Temple.
Virality
On Facebook, the video has amassed 670 K views. It was shared here, here, and here.
On X, the video was shared with other clips claiming Trump had vowed to build the Third Temple here, here, here, here. On its own, the video was shared here and here.
On YouTube, the video was shared here, here, here, here, here, and here.
On Instagram, the video was shared here, here, and here.
Conclusion: The claim is false as Trump did not vow to build the Third Temple in Jerusalem. In the video, Rabbi Katz only expressed his hope to have the Temple built.
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Background image in cover photo: Pew Research Center