PA slams US envoy to the UN Nikki Haley as ‘ambassador from Israel’

The Palestinian Authority’s foreign ministry responds angrily to US opposition to a UNESCO vote on declaring the Old City of Hebron a “world heritage site in danger.”

US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley urged UN leaders to oppose the efforts, which would label the Tomb of Patriarchs in Hebron as a Palestinian world heritage site.

“This is not the first message in which the American ambassador has expressed her hidden malice and hatred toward the Palestinians,” the PA says in a statement. “After she prevented the appointment of Dr. Salam Fayyad as the UN envoy in Libya, she recently affirmed that she would prevent the appointment of any Palestinian in the United Nations and its institutions, confirming her racist and anti-Palestinian position, and its clear hostility to Palestine.”

The statement criticizes “the crude intervention of the US ambassador in the work of UNESCO and the attempt to influence the independence of the UN organization by pressing the member countries of the World Heritage Committee to vote against the Palestinian request to put Hebron on the World Heritage List.” It slams the move as “complete bias in favor of Israel,” and says it “confirms what has been reported in the corridors of the United Nations in New York. Recently, many foreign diplomats have expressed that Haley is an ambassador from Israel more than an ambassador from her country, the United States of America.”

The PA foreign ministry calls on the US State Department to clarify its position on Haley’s statements.

— Dov Lieber