WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden on Thursday underlined his support for the legal “status quo” of Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque compound in a meeting at the White House with Jordanian King Abdullah II.
Biden, the king and Crown Prince Hussein had a private lunch in which the US president “reaffirmed the close, enduring nature of the friendship between the United States and Jordan,” the White House said.
Referring to growing tensions around the Al-Aqsa mosque — located on a site venerated both by Muslims and Jews inside Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem — Biden reaffirmed “the critical need to preserve the historic status quo.”
Biden also recognized Jordan’s “crucial role as the custodian of Muslim holy places in Jerusalem,” the White House said in a statement.
On the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Biden reiterated the US position of “strong support for a two-state solution,” also thanking King Abdullah “for his close partnership and the role he and Jordan play as a force for stability in the Middle East.”
Al-Aqsa mosque is the third-holiest place in Islam and the most sacred site to Jews, who refer to the compound as the Temple Mount.
Under a longstanding status quo, non-Muslims can visit the site at specific times but are not allowed to pray there.
In recent years, a growing number of Jews, most of them Israeli nationalists, have covertly prayed at the compound, angering Palestinians. In January, the national security minister in Israel’s new far-right government made his own visit to the site, sparking a torrent of international condemnation.
Biden underlines support for Jordan in meeting with king
https://arab.news/p9v3t
Biden underlines support for Jordan in meeting with king
- Biden recognized Jordan's "crucial role as the custodian of Muslim holy places in Jerusalem”
UN votes to end mission in Yemeni city of Hodeida
- The resolution approved Tuesday, which was sponsored by Britain, stipulates that the UN mission in Hodeida — known as UNMHA — must close as of March 31
UNITED NATIONS, United States: The UN Security Council voted Tuesday to terminate a mission that tried to enforce a ceasefire in war-torn Yemen’s port city of Hodeida.
“Houthi obstructionism has left the mission without a purpose, and it has to close,” said Tammy Bruce of the US delegation, one of 13 on the 15 member council to support ending the mission’s mandate.
The UN mission is now scheduled to conclude in two months.
Yemen’s internationally recognized government is a patchwork of groups held together by their opposition to the Iran-backed Houthis, who ousted them from the capital Sanaa in 2014 and now rule much of the country’s north. They also hold Hodeida.
The Houthis have been at war with the government, backed by a Saudi-led coalition since 2015, in a conflict that has killed hundreds of thousands of Yemenis and triggered a major humanitarian crisis.
Since 2021 the Houthis have periodically detained UN staffers and still hold some of them.
The resolution approved Tuesday, which was sponsored by Britain, stipulates that the UN mission in Hodeida — known as UNMHA — must close as of March 31. It has been there since 2019.
Russia and China abstained from the vote.
“For six years, UNMHA has served as a critical stabilizing presence” in the region and “actively deterred and prevented a return to full scale conflict,” said Danish representative Christina Markus Lassen.
“The dynamics of the conflict have evolved, and the operating environment has significantly narrowed as UN personnel have become the target of the Houthis’ arbitrary detentions,” Lassen said.
The war in the poorest country in the Arabian peninsula has triggered the worst humanitarian crisis anywhere in the world, the United Nations says.
It expects things to get worse in 2026 as hungry Yemenis find it even harder to get food and international aid drops off.
