Muslims call for east Jerusalem to be recognized as the Palestinians’ capital
Seek to avoid U.S. involvement in talks
ISTANBUL — Breaking with years of courting the U.S., Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called Wednesday for the United Nations to replace Washington as a Mideast mediator and suggested he might not cooperate with the Trump administration’s much-anticipated effort to hammer out an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.
At a summit in Turkey, Arab and Muslim leaders “rejected and condemned” President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital — the trigger for Mr. Abbas’ sharp policy pivot — and called for world recognition of a Palestinian state with its capital in east Jerusalem.
The Istanbul Declaration on “Freedom for al-Quds” — the Arabic name of Jerusalem — followed Wednesday’s extraordinary summit of the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation.
The final communique lacked tougher criticism of U.S. policy contained in an earlier draft. The draft communique distributed to reporters before the closing of the summit had called east Jerusalem the capital of a future Palestinian state, and said Washington had forfeited its decades-long role as a mediator and was threatening global security.
With the softened final version, the organization declared the U.S. announcement as “null and void,” while inviting Mr. Trump to reconsider and rescind the “unlawful decision that might trigger chaos in the region.”
While the nations stopped
short of backing Abbas’ more combative approach toward Washington, the Istanbul Declaration called on countries that have not yet recognized Palestine to do so and invited “the whole world to recognize East Al Quds as the capital.”
And Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who hosted the summit, stuck to the harder line, saying at a news conference that it is “out of the question” for Washington to continue mediating between Israel and the Palestinians.
“That process is now over,” he said.
A possible Palestinian refusal to engage with the U.S. and growing backlash against Mr. Trump’s shift on Jerusalem, including from Arab allies, cast new doubt over the administration’s already seemingly remote chances of brokering a deal and succeeding where its predecessors have failed.
U.S. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Wednesday the administration would continue to work on a Mideast plan that it believes will benefit Israelis and Palestinians. Referring to Mr. Abbas, she said that the “type of rhetoric that we heard has prevented peace in the past, and it’s not necessarily surprising that those types of things would be said.”
In shunning the U.S., Mr. Abbas would find himself in uncharted territory.
He does not have an immediate practical alternative to more than two decades of U.S.-led negotiations on the terms of Palestinian statehood. The Palestinians seek such a state on lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war — the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem.
On the other hand, Mr. Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital was decried by Palestinians and others in the region as a provocative show of pro-Israel bias, making it difficult for Mr. Abbas to justify dealing with Washington as a mediator.
Mr. Trump’s argument that his announcement does not mean an endorsement of specific boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem has not gained traction in the ensuing uproar.
The fate of Jerusalem is a hot-button issue in the region, and even the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Egypt — reportedly eager to help advance Mr. Trump’s Mideast efforts — cannot afford to be seen as soft on the religious claims of Muslims and political claims of Palestinians to the contested city. Israeliannexed east Jerusalem is home to Islam’s third-holiest shrine, along with the most revered site in Judaism and a major Christian church.
Mr. Abbas’ speech marked a high-profile break with what had been his unwavering policy in more than a decade as Palestinian leader.
Despite setbacks, he had considered a close relationship with the U.S. the centerpiece of his efforts to win Palestinian statehood through negotiations.
When Mr. Trump was elected a year ago, Mr. Abbas went out of his way not to criticize the new president, for fear of harming the relationship.
On Wednesday, he expressed a sense of betrayal.
“We were shocked by the U.S. administration,” Mr. Abbas said. “While we engaged with them in the peace process for the sake of a deal for the ages, [Mr. Trump] delivered a slap for the ages.”
Mr. Abbas said the United States has disqualified itself as a mediator. “We will no longer accept that it has a role in the political process,” Mr. Abbas said.
The Palestinian leader said he remains committed to a two-state solution, but that he would push for the U.N. to assume responsibility and “find a new mechanism” for resolving the conflict.
In another sign of a harder Palestinian stance, Mr. Abbas aides said earlier this week that he would not meet with Mike Pence when the U.S. vice president visits the region, starting this weekend.
Mr. Abbas was initially to have hosted Mr. Pence, a devout Christian, in the biblical West Bank town of Bethlehem, following the vice president’s visit to Israel.
Mr. Trump’s nod to Israel on Jerusalem came at a time of mounting speculation about the terms of an Israeli- Palestinian deal the U.S. might propose.
Palestinian officials have said they have not heard anything official from the U.S. team led by Trump sonin-law Jared Kushner or from the powerful Saudi crown prince who met Mr. Abbas last month.
Saudi Arabia did not participate in a high-level capacity in Wednesday’s summit.
But in Riyadh, King Salman and his heir met Wednesday with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who also leads the United Arab Emirates’ armed forces. A statement said they discussed “the serious repercussions of the negative decision of the U.S. to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.”