Middle East Eye / June 11, 2022
Mahmoud Abbas reiterated request to have PLO removed from US terror list and that American consulate for East Jerusalem be reopened.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas hosted on Saturday a US delegation led by Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf, ahead of an expected visit by US President Joe Biden.
Abbas reiterated his request to have the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) removed from the US list of terrorist entities during the meeting, his office said.
The Palestinian president also requested that the PLO’s office in Washington and the American consulate for East Jerusalem be reopened, after both were closed under the Trump administration, the Palestinian presidency said in a statement, according to AFP.
Leaf, who began a three-day trip to the Palestinian territories and Israel on Saturday, met Abbas “to discuss the US-Palestinian relationship, US assistance to Palestinians, deepening ties and how Palestinians and Israelis alike deserve equal measures of freedom, security and prosperity,” the State Department said.
Meanwhile, the US on Thursday changed the title of its Palestinian Affairs Unit to Office of Palestinian Affairs (OPA), without defining it as a consulate. Before the announcement, it had been the US consulate in Jerusalem and a focus of Palestinian statehood goals in the city.
The US consulate in East Jerusalem had served Palestinians for almost 175 years under several powers that controlled the holy city. It was shut down in March 2019 when then US President Donald Trump signaled support for Israel’s claim on Jerusalem as its capital.
The unit “operates under the auspices of the US embassy in Jerusalem, and reports on substantive matters directly to the” State Department, an OPA spokesperson said, noting the new structuring was “to strengthen our diplomatic reporting and public diplomacy engagement”.
“The name change was done to better align with state department nomenclature. The new OPA operating structure is designed to strengthen our diplomatic reporting and public diplomacy engagement.”
According to Reuters, a senior Palestinian official said that Abbas had rejected alternatives to the reopening of the US consulate in Jerusalem, in a call with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
