Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday urged the world to recognize Al-Quds (Jerusalem) as the capital of Palestine, as Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas warned there could be no peace in the Middle East until such a move was made.
Erdogan opened in Istanbul an emergency summit of the world’s main pan-Islamic body the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), seeking to marshal Muslim leaders towards a coordinated response to the US move.
Abbas warned that the United States has lost its role as the mediator in the so-called peace process between Israelis and the Palestinians as a result of the move by US President Donald Trump.
Erdogan described ‘Israel’ as a state defined by “occupation and terror”.
“With this decision, Israel was rewarded for all the terrorist activities it has carried out. It is Trump who bestowed this award even,” he said.
Erdogan added: “I am inviting the countries who value international law and fairness to recognize occupied Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine,” saying Islamic countries would “never give up” on this demand.
Abbas warned that there could be “no peace or stability” in the Middle East until Jerusalem is recognized as the capital of a Palestinian state.
“Jerusalem is and will forever be the capital of the Palestinian state… There will be no peace, no stability without that,” Abbas told the meeting.
He slammed the recognition by Trump of the holy city as the capital of ‘Israel’ as a “gift” to the “Zionist movement” as if he “were giving away an American city,” adding that Washington no longer had any role to play in the Middle East peace process.
“We do not accept any role of the United States in the political process from now on. Because it is completely biased towards Israel,” he said.
Erdogan, whose country holds the rotating chairmanship of the OIC, will be hoping to unite often feuding Muslim leaders into a tough final statement on the move by Trump.
Source: AFP
