JEDDAH: The US president and his secretary of state denounced Qatar Friday in the strongest and clearest terms since the beginning of the diplomatic crisis, demanding that Doha immediately stop funding terrorism in the region.
President Donald Trump accused Qatar of funding terror “at a very high level,” and said solving the problem in the tiny Gulf nation could be “the beginning of the end of terrorism.”
Addressing a joint press conference with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis at the White House on Friday, Trump said Qatar “has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level.”
Praising Saudi King Salman as “my friend,” Trump said he hopes the summit he attended in Riyadh will be the beginning of the end of terrorism funding.
“We had a decision to make, do we take the easy road or do we finally take a hard but necessary action. We have to stop the funding of terrorism. I decided... the time had come to call on Qatar to end its funding.”
Trump said Arab leaders he met with in Saudi Arabia last month had urged him to confront Qatar over its behavior.
Other US officials have said Qatar has already taken some steps to reduce terror funding but that the steps are insufficient.
It was not immediately clear how Trump’s sharp condemnation might affect US cooperation with Qatar, which hosts some 10,000 US troops and a major US air base that serves as a staging ground for operations in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. The Qatari Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Earlier, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Qatar must do more, “more quickly” to combat extremism.
Delivering a short statement at the State Department in Washington on Friday, he said: “US expectation is that Gulf countries would immediately take steps to de-escalate situation in region.”
“The GCC must emerge united and stronger,” he said.
Tillerson called on Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt to ease the blockade on Qatar.
He faulted Qatar for allowing funds to flow to extremist groups. He said the US was asking Qatar to “be responsive to the concerns of its neighbors.”
“Qatar has a history of supporting groups that span the spectrum of political expression, from activism to violence,” Tillerson said.
He added: “He (the Qatari emir) must do more, and he must do it more quickly.”
Tillerson said the crisis was indeed affecting the US military.
Western diplomats accuse Qatar’s government of allowing or even encouraging the funding of some extremists, such as Al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria.
On Friday, Qatar’s neighbors put 12 organizations and 59 people on a terror sanctions list and described them as being associated with Qatar, in a fresh attempt to increase pressure.
Qatar, which has vowed to ride out the isolation, dismissed the terror listing as part of “baseless allegations that hold no foundation in fact.”
— With input from AP
Trump says time for Qatar to stop funding terror
Trump says time for Qatar to stop funding terror
Family of Palestinian-American shot dead by Israeli settler demand accountability
- Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community
LONDON: The family of a 19-year-old Palestinian-American man reportedly shot dead by an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank have demanded accountability, amid mounting scrutiny over a surge in settler violence and a lack of prosecutions.
Nasrallah Abu Siyam, a US citizen born in Philadelphia, was killed near the city of Ramallah on Wednesday, becoming at least the sixth American citizen to die in incidents involving Israeli settlers or soldiers in the territory in the past two years.
Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community. Witnesses said that stones were thrown by both sides before settlers opened fire, wounding at least three villagers.
Abu Siyam was struck and later died of his injuries.
Abdulhamid Siyam, the victim’s cousin, said the killing reflected a wider pattern of impunity.
“A young man of 19 shot and killed in cold blood, and no responsibility,” he told the BBC. “Impunity completely.”
The US State Department said that it was aware of the death of a US citizen and was “carefully monitoring the situation,” while the Trump administration said that it stood ready to provide consular assistance.
The Israeli embassy in Washington said the incident was under review and that an operational inquiry “must be completed as soon as possible.”
A spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces said troops were deployed to the scene and used “riot dispersal means to restore order,” adding that no IDF gunfire was reported.
The military confirmed that the incident remained under review and said that a continued presence would be maintained in the area to prevent further unrest.
Palestinians and human rights organizations say such reviews rarely lead to criminal accountability, arguing that Israeli authorities routinely fail to prosecute settlers accused of violence.
A US embassy spokesperson later said that Washington “condemns this violence,” as international concern continues to grow over conditions in the occupied West Bank.
Palestinians and human rights groups say Israeli authorities routinely fail to investigate or prosecute settlers accused of violence against civilians.
Those concerns were echoed this week by the UN, which warned that Israel’s actions in the occupied West Bank may amount to ethnic cleansing.
A UN human rights office report on Thursday said that Israeli settlement expansion, settler attacks and military operations have increasingly displaced Palestinian communities, with dozens of villages reportedly emptied since the start of the Gaza war.
The report also criticized Israeli military tactics in the northern West Bank, saying that they resembled warfare and led to mass displacement, while noting abuses by Palestinian security forces, including the use of unnecessary lethal force and the intimidation of critics.
Neither Israel’s foreign ministry nor the Palestinian Authority has commented on the findings.
