Abbas warns breaking off relations with US over ‘legalization’ of West Bank settlements

TEHRAN (defapress) – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has threatened to end the relationship with the US after the Trump administration declared Israel's Jewish-only settlements in the West Bank – illegal under international law – legal.

News ID: 79383

Date: 27 November 2019 - 15:05

“We are ready to go to a complete breakdown of relations with [the US],” Abbas told Russian journalists on Tuesday. He explained that “almost every country in the world” has condemned US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's statement legitimizing the settlements last week, and Palestinian authorities were not willing to let such a brash move go unaddressed.

“The US administration has long been hostile to the Palestinian people,” Abbas continued, recalling that President Donald Trump's so-called “deal of the century” kicked off by cutting off Palestinian refugee aid through UNRWA and relocating the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Pompeo declared last week that Israeli settlements were no longer inconsistent with international law, reversing a 1978 State Department legal opinion and setting Washington at odds with the rest of the world, which considers the settlements – built on occupied land and restricted to Jewish inhabitants – illegal.

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