Saeb Erekat says GOP candidate’s comments show ‘disregard for international law, longstanding US foreign policy’
A senior Palestinian official on Monday said a pledge by Republican candidate Donald Trump to recognize an undivided Jerusalem as Israel’s capital shows a “disregard for international law.”
On Sunday, Trump told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York that if elected president, he would recognize Jerusalem as the “undivided capital” of Israel.
In response, former chief peace negotiator Saeb Erekat said Trump’s comments show “disregard for international law, longstanding US foreign policy regarding the status of Jerusalem, including the occupation and illegal annexation of occupied East Jerusalem, as well as hundreds of millions of Arabs, including Palestinian Christians and Muslims.”
The Republican presidential hopeful’s statement also “neglects the calls made by millions of US citizens for peace between Israel and Palestine based on freedom, justice and equality,” Erekat added.
Erekat also lambasted comments by Trump’s Israel adviser, David Friedman, who earlier this month said the Republican nominee would not force a peace deal on Israel if elected. On Saturday, Friedman said Israel could annex the West Bank and still retain its Jewish character.
“Previous statements delivered by his adviser on Israel show a total abandonment of the two-state solution, international law and UN resolutions, and underscore the urgency of President Abbas’s call at the General Assembly for the international community to bring an end to the occupation and salvage the two-state solution before it is too late,” he said.
A statement issued by the Trump campaign after the Trump-Netanyahu meeting in Trump Tower, Manhattan, said “Mr. Trump acknowledged that Jerusalem has been the eternal capital of the Jewish People for over 3,000 years, and that the United States, under a Trump administration, will finally accept the longstanding Congressional mandate to recognize Jerusalem as the undivided capital of the State of Israel.”
Netanyahu also met with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton on Sunday afternoon.
During the confab, Clinton told Netanyahu Sunday that, if elected, she would oppose any attempts to impose an outside solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as well as any one-sided action at the UN.
As reported by The Times of Israel