Pence in Jerusalem pledges embassy move by end of 2019, faces protest

On Tuesday, Pence, a devout Christian, will visit Jerusalem’s Western Wall, one of the holiest sites in Judaism.

Trump became the first sitting US president to visit the site when he travelled to Jerusalem in May 2017.

The site is located in east Jerusalem, occupied by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed in a move never recognised by the international community.

The city’s status is perhaps the most sensitive in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the Palestinians’ reaction to Trump’s recognition was an illustration of the importance placed upon it.

Beyond refusing to meet Pence, Abbas has said the United States can no longer serve as mediator in negotiations and denounced Trump’s peace efforts as the “slap of the century”.

The Palestinians were planning a general strike on Tuesday to protest Trump’s declaration.

Unrest since the announcement has left 18 Palestinians dead, most of them killed in clashes with Israeli forces. One Israeli has been killed in that time.

– ‘Return to the table’ –
In his speech to parliament, Pence said “we strongly urge the Palestinian leadership to return to the table. Peace can only come through dialogue.”

The 82-year-old Abbas said in Brussels that “we are keen on continuing on the way of negotiations because we believe it is the only way forward to reach a negotiated solution and peace between us and Israel.”

He has however pushed for an internationally led process.

Netanyahu appeared more interested in talking with Pence on other issues, including Iran, Israel’s main enemy.

Pence dedicated part of his speech to Iran, saying the United States “will never allow” it to acquire a nuclear weapon and pledging to “work with Israel and with nations across the world to confront the leading state sponsor of terror.”

The US move to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital broke with decades of international consensus that the city’s status should be settled as part of a two-state peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.

Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its capital, while the Palestinians see the eastern sector as the capital of their future state.

Israelis and Palestinians alike interpreted Trump’s move as Washington taking Israel’s side in the conflict — a view reinforced by the White House’s recent decision to withhold financing for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

In Jerusalem, Pence repeated Trump’s view that the United States will support a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “if both sides agree.”