Palestine president Mahmoud Abbas recalls envoy to US over Donald Trump's decision to shift American embassy to Jerusalem

Ramallah: Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas withdrew his top representative to the United States on Tuesday, announced the foreign ministry a day after the US moved its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem. Husam Zomlot, the head of the Palestine Liberation Organisation’s office in Washington, would return to the Palestinian territories on Wednesday, the statement said, but it did not mention as to how long would he be withdrawn for. [caption id=“attachment_3734427” align=“alignleft” width=“300”]  File image of Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas. AFP[/caption] The Palestinians reacted furiously to President Donald Trump’s December announcement recognising Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moving his country’s embassy there from Tel Aviv. The Palestinians consider the eastern part of Jerusalem as their capital and the countries have long kept their embassies in Tel Aviv, further the future of the holy city was an issue to be negotiated between the Israelis and Palestinians. The date of the embassy’s opening also angered Palestinian as it came on the day they commemorated their mass displacement in the 1948 war surrounding the creation of Israel. The Israeli government welcomed the embassy move but the event was overshadowed by mass protests along the Gaza border where the Israeli fire killed 60 Palestinians. The foreign ministry’s statement did not refer to the deaths but only the embassy move.