The head of Israel’s Arab coalition party has vowed to boycott the flash visit by U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, expected to arrive in Israel on Sunday evening.
“We were asked if there’s a change in our position regarding Pence’s visit,” Joint Arab List chairman, lawmaker Ayman Odeh, wrote on Twitter. “He is a dangerous man with a messianic vision that includes the destruction of the entire region.
“He comes here as the emissary of a man who is even more dangerous,” Odeh wrote in reference to U.S. President Trump, who he called a “a political pyromaniac, a racist misogynist who cannot be allowed to be lead the way in our region.
“The entire Joint List will boycott his speech in the plenum,” Odeh wrote regarding Pence’s planned speech on Monday in the Knesset.
Arab MK calls Pence ‘dangerous, messianic,’ will boycott his Knesset speech https://t.co/CNEuxx11Sd pic.twitter.com/95l7ADQiDw
— The Times of Israel (@TimesofIsrael) January 20, 2018
Ahmed Tibi, another lawmaker from the party, said they were boycotting Pence because “Trump’s speech on Jerusalem and Pence’s own positions, as Pence is one of those pushing for the U.S. to relocate the embassy [to Jerusalem] and because of his outrageous claim that they have taken Jerusalem off the table. This administration is part of the problem, not the solution.”
Pence embarked Saturday on a trip to the Middle East, despite a U.S. government shutdown. His spokeswoman explained that that Pence’s meetings with Egypt, Jordan and Israel are “integral to America’s national security and diplomatic objectives.”
Mike Pence visiting Israel. Hear what Dany Ayalon (Israel's UN Ambassador) says about the visit. https://t.co/hsVI7GDD9m
— JerseyFOI (@jerseyisrael) January 21, 2018
Pence was originally supposed to arrive to the area in December, but the White House delayed his visit by a month as a result of the vote in Congress over the Republican tax plan.
Over the last few days, rumors circulated that his trip might again be delayed once again because of the internal political crisis in Washington that led to the government shutdown on Saturday, but the White House made it clear that the trip would not be postponed.
(Haaretz, PC, Social Media)
