Pakistan will not have ties with Israel until Palestinian state forms

Pakistani demonstrators shout anti-US and Israel slogans in a rally in Lahore on 14 December 2017, following US President Donald Trump’s decision to officially recognise Jerusalem as the Israeli capital. [AFP via Getty Images]

Speaker of Pakistan’s National Assembly, Asad Qaiser, said yesterday that his country would never have relations with Israel before the creation of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, Quds Net reported.

During a visit by the Palestinian Authority’s ambassador to Islamabad, Ahmed Rabei, Qaiser said that Pakistan believes that all conflicts must be resolved through negotiations.

Pakistan, he continued, would continue to offer diplomatic support for the Palestinian people.

Since the recognition of the PLO as the legal and sole representative of Palestinian people and the opening of an embassy in Islamabad in the 1970s, Qaiser said, about 50,000 Palestinian students have completed their higher education in Pakistan’s universities.

He criticised the US’ “peace deal” for the Middle East and expressed his country’s opposition to it because it does not fulfil any Palestinian demands including the creation of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

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