Abbas demands US open consulate to PA in Jerusalem

Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas met with US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan in Ramallah Thursday and demanded that the Biden Administration open a US consulate to the PA in eastern Jerusalem.

The PA’s official WAFA news agency reported that Abbas claimed to Sullivan that “the destructive measures taken by the new Israeli government with the aim of destroying the two-state solution and the chances of peace and stability in the region.”

Abbas included in these measures “settlements, daily killings, the raids into Palestinian cities and towns, and the desecration of Al-Aqsa Mosque (Jews visiting the Temple Mount) and the Christian and Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem,” as well as Israel’s punitive measures against the PA in response to its attempt to have the International Court of Justice in the Hague rule on the Jewish presence in Judea and Samaria, such as transferring PA tax revenue to families of Israeli victims of terrorism.

Abbas called on the Biden Administration to act to stop these measures immediately, “before it is too late,” stressing that “we will not accept the continuation of these Israeli crimes, we will fight them and defend the rights of our people, our country and our holy places.”

He further demanded that the US reopen its consulate to the PA in Jerusalem and the PLO office in Washington DC, both of which were closed during the Trump Administration.