Mike Pence visits Middle East but US role as peace broker may be over

It’s not the trip to the Holy Land that Mike Pence might have imagined. For a start, the US vice-president – an evangelical Christian – is no longer welcome in Jesus’s birthplace of Bethlehem.

Donald Trump doomed Pence’s chances of a visit to the West Bank when he reversed decades of US policy last month by recognising Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. This broke a longstanding international consensus that the issue would be negotiated in peace talks with the Palestinians, who also claim parts of the city.

While Trump did not rule out a future division of Jerusalem, the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, swiftly rescinded Pence’s invitation to meet him and visit Bethlehem, while senior Christian clerics in Egypt – where Pence arrives on Saturday at the start of his four-day trip ­– also cancelled planned events.

Since then, relations between the Palestinian leadership and Washington further soured this week after the US administration froze $65m in aid money for the UN agency responsible for Palestinian refugees. The cut has placed UNRWA in the most severe funding crisis of its seven-decade history.

Trump has said he wants to revitalise long-stalled peace talks in pursuit of what he has described as the “ultimate deal”. Yet when Pence touches down in Tel Aviv on Sunday evening, the US’s role as mediator in the conflict may be over for good.

Palestinian leaders say that the US can no longer act as an honest peace broker; last weekend, Abbas denounced Trump’s actions as the “slap of the century”.

Recent statements from the vice-president’s office have not even mentioned peace talks, saying instead that the trip will focus on security issues.

Press secretary Alyssa Farah said Pence – who will also meet the Egyptian president, Abdel Fatah Al-Sisi on Saturday and Jordan’s King Abdullah on Sunday – will “discuss ways to work together to fight terrorism and improve our national security”.

Next week, the former congressman and governor of Indiana will hold meetings with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and deliver an address to the country’s parliament, the Knesset. He will visit the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial and the Western Wall, the holiest Jewish site where worshippers can pray.

In Jerusalem, signs can been seen welcoming Pence as a “true friend” of Israel.

The ancient city – home to major Muslim, Christian and Jewish sites – was captured in the 1967 six-day war by Israel, which claims it as an “eternal and undivided” capital. Palestinians claim Jerusalem’s eastern sector, which includes the walled old city – an area they hope will be the capital of their future state.

Pence has visited Israel four times before and pushed for Trump’s inflammatory policies in the Middle East, standing next to the president when he made the recent announcement about Jerusalem.

Pence criticised Barack Obama in 2010 for not taking sides in the conflict.

“America’s on the side of Israel,” Pence told the Christian Broadcasting Network. “And to send any other message than our unwavering support, that we will stand with what the sovereign government and the people of Israel decide is in their interest, I think represents a departure from where the heart of the American people are at.”

In Congress, Pence pushed to limit US aid to the Palestinian Authority and is a vocal advocate of the separation wall Israel has built. He has remained popular with evangelical voters in the US.

Trump has tasked his son-in-law Jared Kushner with spearheading a fresh peace initiative, although details of that effort remain scant.

On Wednesday, Abbas said: “Jerusalem will be a gate for peace only if it is Palestine’s capital, and it will be a gate of war, fear and the absence of security and stability – God forbid – if it is not,” he said.

“It’s the gate for peace and war and President Trump must choose between the two.”