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Next week, Mike Pompeo could become the first US secretary of state to visit an illegal Israeli settlement.
Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh has said that a planned visit next week by the US Secretary of State to an illegal Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank would set a “dangerous precedent”.
Mike Pompeo would become the first US Secretary of State to visit one of the settlements, considered illegal by most of the international community.
The visit planned for next week is a way to “legitimize the settlements” and creates “a dangerous precedent that violates international law,” Shtayyeh said on Friday, as quoted by the Palestinian news agency WAFA.
The Axios news website reported that the top diplomat will land in Israel on Wednesday and is expected to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials.
The trip is intended to highlight policy changes by the administration of US President Donald Trump on Israel, Axios reported.
Pompeo’s visit to Israel comes exactly one year after he said the United States did not consider Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory illegal, putting Washington at odds with United Nations Security Council resolutions.
Pompeo is expected to visit the occupied West Bank winery in Psagot, which has released a label bearing his name in tribute to his visit, Israeli media reported.
The illegal Israeli settlement of Psagot on the eastern outskirts of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank [Ahmad Gharabli/AFP]
The winery has unsuccessfully defied a European decision to put a label on all products that come from illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank.
The State Department has not confirmed Pompeo’s itinerary.
In a statement earlier this week, he only said that he would visit Israel and meet with Netanyahu.
‘Pompeo and 2024’
Pompeo’s trip comes two months before President-elect Joe Biden, a former critic of the illegal settlements, took office.
Maher Mezher, a member of the Central Committee of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, told Anadolu Agency that Pompeo’s visit is aimed at legalizing Israel’s illegal settlement policies and showing the US administration’s support for Israel.
Trump has been trying to increase political tension in the region even in the last days of his presidency, Mezher said.
Aaron David Miller, a veteran US diplomat in the Middle East, tweeted that Pompeo’s visit “is not about Trump or Bibi’s policy; it’s about Pompeo and 2024, ”referring to Netanyahu by his nickname.
Pompeo has made little secret of his aspirations for higher office and has frequently pointed out his support for Israel, a key cause for the evangelical Christian base of his Republican Party.
Roughly 450,000 Jewish settlers live alongside some 2.8 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967.
Last month, Peace Now, a settlement watchdog group, reported that 2020 marked one of the most prolific years for illegal settlement construction in Israel.
The latest approvals in October brought the number of illegal settlement homes to more than 12,150, the highest number since Paz Now began recording the numbers in 2012.
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