UK’s Prince William to meet Abbas, but Palestinians unmoved by his visit to the region
Prince William is scheduled to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah today, but Palestinians say they are unmoved by the first official visit by a member of Britain’s royal family to the region London once ruled.
The prince met Israeli leaders yesterday before meeting Mr Abbas and Palestinian refugees today.
“To be honest, I personally have no feelings over that visit,” said a Palestinian official .
“I find it irrelevant. I haven’t seen anything special so far.”
Palestinians on the street expressed indifference about the royal’s first visit to the West Bank city where the Palestinian Authority is located.
“Why should people in Palestine care? This is the question,” said Mousa, 23, from Ramallah, who declined to give his last name. “Does he give them something they do not have? If our president visited your country, would you care?” he said, explaining his coolness towards William’s visit.
On the other side of the decades-old conflict, William was feted by Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu and President Reuven Rivlin.
After a tour of Israel’s Holocaust memorial, the prince was greeted by Mr Netanyahu and his wife, Sara, at their official residence in Jerusalem.
“Welcome to Israel, a great historic visit. The whole people of Israel are excited,” Mr Netanyahu said.
At a meeting with Mr Rivlin, the prince, on a trip described by Britain as non-political, said he hoped “peace in the area can be achieved”. Israeli-Palestinian peace talks collapsed in 2014.
But his visit also roused the ire of several right-wing Israeli political figures, who objected to his itinerary including the term “occupied Palestinian
territories” for East Jerusalem, the area of the contested city that Palestinians have earmarked as the capital of any future sovereign state.
Israeli cabinet member and Jerusalem Affairs Minister for Israel, Zeev Elkin, wrote on Facebook that the use of the term was a distortion that cannot “change reality”.
“It’s regrettable that Britain chose to politicise the royal visit,” Mr Elkin said, Israeli news site Ynet reported.
Philip Hall, Britain’s consul general in Jerusalem, said London was following decades of rulings in the United Nations that declare East Jerusalem, including the Old City, part of the occupied Palestinian territories. “There is no change in the position.”
US President Donald Trump recently moved Washington’s embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, effectively recognising the city as Israel’s undivided capital.
But the decision was rejected by most of the international community.
Britain captured Palestine from the Ottoman Empire in 1917 during the First World War and administered the territory under international mandate until 1948, pulling out a day before Israel declared independence.
Until now it had been British policy not to make an official royal visit until the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was resolved.