U.S. President Donald Trump's visit to the Western Wall in Jerusalem on Monday was pictured on the front pages newspapers all over the world. The somber setting, with Trump silently looking at the ancient stones, stood in stark contrast to the often unscripted demeanor of the 45th president. Trump says he is a religious man but has rarely put this on display. Britain's Independent had the picture in the center of its online edition's home page, with a header "Trump scales a diplomatic wall." The Wall Street Journal ran a caption saying that Trump is the first sitting president to visit the Western Wall but also noted that White House officials have refused to say whether they believe the site lies within Israeli territory, in keeping with the long-standing American view that the status of Jerusalem should be determined through peace talks. Coverage of the Israel visit by the U.S. media was largely overshadowed by the recent developments surrounding the ongoing investigation into the alleged ties between Trump's advisors and Russia during the election. A panel on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" agreed that Trumps' speech in Saudi Arabia was a major success because of Muslim leaders' willingness to combat the funding of terrorism. The panelists said that Trump successfully rallied the Sunni leaders, who were disappointed by Obama and considered his rapprochement with Iran a threat to the region's stability. The show's host Joe Scarborough said Obama's posture in the Middle East "united the Sunni world and moved them closer to Israel and the United States than any time since the early 1950s." According to Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, who was also on the panel, Trump's visit to the region stood in stark contrast to Obama's foreign trip to this part of the world several months into his first term. "The theme of Obama's trip [in 2009] was 'I am going to reach out to our enemies'; the theme of Trump's trip -- 'I am going to embrace our friends,'" he said. Richard N. Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said the first part of the trip, the visit to Saudi Arabia and Israel, was the easy part, but now the president will have to face a less friendly audience, European leaders, who largely prefer his predecessor. Meanwhile the Washington Post highlighted the fact that Trump arrived on what was the first direct flight from Riyadh to Tel Aviv. "Why Trumps flight from Saudi Arabia to Israel is a big deal ," ran the headline of that piece, which went on to explain that the symbolic development could potentially help improve relations between the two countries. The New York Times also noted that first lady Melania Trump was keeping a relatively high profile during the visit. "Unusual place for a presidents family on a foreign trip: center stage," ran the headline. Inside, the piece said that the first lady visited children at a Jerusalem hospital and that Ivanka Trump stepped in for her father when he was too tired to participate in an online Twitter forum in Saudi Arabia. Trump's picture at the Western Wall was also the butt of jokes in the opening monologues in late-night TV shows in the United States, with hosts drawing comparisons between the ancient site to Trump's proposed wall on the American-Mexican border. Stephen Colbert, the host of the "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert," said that upon arriving at the wall, Trump told the Israelis, "Nice wall, how did you get Mexico to pay for it-" Another late-night host, Seth Meyers jokingly said that after visiting the wall, Trump said, "The wall was the reason Israel doesnt have any Mexicans."
