PA’s Abbas hosts US House Speaker Pelosi for rare West Bank meeting

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas met with United States House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and members of a Congressional delegation in Ramallah on Thursday, with the Palestinian leader saying the two sides must “overcome the obstacles on the path to ties.”

Pelosi has been in Israel this week leading a delegation of eight Democratic party lawmakers to the region. She met Prime Minister Naftali Bennett earlier on Thursday in Jerusalem.

The meeting was a rare high-level meeting between Abbas and a senior American politician. The Palestinian Authority saw only a handful such visits in recent years when ties soured during former president Donald Trump’s administration.

Abbas also called for more pressure to end what he said were “unilateral Israeli actions” that threatened the eventual establishment of a Palestinian state, an apparent reference to Israel settlement construction. Pelosi, for her part, stated her “commitment to peace on the basis of a two-state solution,” according to the PA’s official WAFA news agency.

The PA effectively cut ties with Washington in 2017, when Trump moved the US embassy to Jerusalem. During the Trump years, the US government also froze most of its aid to the Palestinians and shuttered the Palestinians’ mission in Washington.

After President Joe Biden entered office last year, relations have slowly improved. Biden has spoken with Abbas over the phone and resumed some aid to United Nations bodies that support Palestinians. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken paid a visit to Ramallah in May following the 2021 war between Israel and Hamas.

But officials in Ramallah have also expressed growing impatience with the pace at which Biden’s administration is moving. A particular bone of contention is the US consulate in Jerusalem, which formerly served as Washington’s mission to the Palestinians.

American officials, including Biden, initially pledged to open the Jerusalem consulate. But the demand has remained effectively blocked due to Israeli objections, The Times of Israel reported in December.

“Even though a year of work by the Biden administration has gone by, in addition to our own positive involvement to strengthen our relations with them, we are still hoping to realize this,” Abbas said at a recent gathering of the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah.

In a phone call last week, senior Fatah official Tawfiq al-Tirawi dubbed the American stances on Palestinian demands “unclear and impractical.”

Pelosi also met with senior Israeli officials — including Bennett, Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid — on Wednesday and Thursday.

“We repeatedly reaffirmed America’s commitment to a just and enduring two-state solution that enhances stability and security for Israel, Palestinians and their neighbors,” Pelosi said in a statement on Wednesday.

According to the Prime Minister’s Office, Pelosi and Bennett also discussed “the central strategic challenges facing Israel, most prominently the Iranian nuclear program.”

Bennett also thanked Pelosi for backing American funding for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system “and stressed the importance of completing the process as soon as possible.”