AMMAN: Jordan’s King Abdullah II has discussed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and his role as custodian of major Muslim and Christian shrines in contested Jerusalem with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
A palace statement says the two met on Friday, a day before Modi’s first-ever visit to the West Bank.
After a public embrace of Israel as a strategic partner, the Indian prime minister is visiting the Palestinian territories and the Gulf countries on Friday to bolster long-standing political and economic ties.
Modi tweeted on Friday that he is looking forward to talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and “reaffirming our support for the Palestinian people and the development of Palestine.”
His visit comes at a time of tensions over President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. The step angered Palestinians who seek Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem as a future capital.
India was one of the earliest champions of the Palestinian cause but in recent years turned to Israel for high-tech military equipment and anti-terrorism cooperation.
Under Modi, whose nationalist party sees Israel as a natural ally against extremism, ties have flourished. Modi made the first trip to Israel by an Indian prime minister last year followed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to India last month.
But Indian officials said India continued to support the Palestinian cause and that Modi’s visit is aimed at helping build up the Palestinians’ capacity in the health, information technology and education areas.
“We have de-hyphenated our relations with Palestine and Israel and now we see them both as mutually independent and exclusive and as part of this policy the prime minister is undertaking this visit,” B. Bala Bhaskar, a joint secretary in the Indian Foreign Ministry, said.
The two sides are building an Indian-Palestinian technology park in Ramallah, the Palestinians’ seat of government, which will develop IT expertise and generate employment.
Modi arrived in Jordan later on Friday and travels to Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, on Saturday. During his visit to Israel last year, he did not travel to the Palestinian headquarters as is usually the case with visiting leaders.
“Looking forward to my discussions with President Mahmoud Abbas and reaffirming our support for the Palestinian people and the development of Palestine,” Modi said in a Twitter post.
India was among more than 120 countries to vote in favor of a resolution in December calling for the US to drop its recent recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
But the scale of India’s security and commercial ties with Israel dwarfs the engagement with the Palestinians. Israel is among India’s top three arms suppliers, doing business worth millions of dollars each year.
Modi and Netanyahu are now pushing for cooperation in agriculture, energy and cybersecurity in addition to defense.
Modi will also travel to the UAE, from where India gets half of its oil, and to Oman, with which India’s navy has built close security ties.
The Gulf is home to 9 million Indians who remit $35 billion home each year, sustaining millions of families. The UAE committed an investment of $75 billion in India when Modi visited in 2015 and the two sides will be looking to advance that goal, the Foreign Ministry said
Indian PM, Jordan king discuss Israeli-Palestinian conflict
Indian PM, Jordan king discuss Israeli-Palestinian conflict
Israel army kills West Bank attacker who tried to run over troops
- The Palestinian civil affairs authority named the man as 20-year-old Qais Sami Jaser Allan, adding that he “was shot by the occupation forces between the towns of Einabus and Awarta”
JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said its troops shot dead a man who tried to run over a group of soldiers in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday.
The incident occurred in Einabus in the northern West Bank, the military said.
“A short while ago, a report was received regarding a terrorist who attempted to run over IDF (Israeli army) soldiers operating in the area of Einabus,” the military said.
“In response, the soldiers fired at the terrorist and eliminated him.”
The Palestinian Red Crescent said it rescued three people after the Israeli army opened fire near Einabus on a vehicle with Palestinian license plates.
“Two of the wounded were shot, and one of them is in critical condition. The third was injured as a result of being beaten,” the Red Crescent said.
The Palestinian civil affairs authority named the man as 20-year-old Qais Sami Jaser Allan, adding that he “was shot by the occupation forces between the towns of Einabus and Awarta.”
The incident came just days after a Palestinian from the West Bank ran over an Israeli in his sixties with his vehicle and later stabbed an 18-year-old girl to death in northern Israel.
The perpetrator was killed during the attack.
Following that incident on Friday, the military conducted a two-day operation in the West Bank town of Qabatiya from where the attacker came, detaining several residents including his father and brothers.
Since the start of the war in Gaza following Hamas’s attack on Israel in October 2023, violence has also surged in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967.
Israeli troops and settlers have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians in the territory, including many militants as well as dozens of civilians, according to an AFP tally based on figures from the Palestinian health ministry.
According to official Israeli figures, at least 44 Israelis, both soldiers and civilians, have also been killed in Palestinian attacks or Israeli military operations in the same period in the West Bank.
