Mike Pompeo visits Israel museum honoring Christian Zionists

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrapped up a visit to Israel on Friday with a go to to a museum in Jerusalem that honors Christian Zionists and was based by a distinguished evangelical adviser to the Trump administration.

The museum go to got here a day after Pompeo grew to become the primary secretary of state to go to an Israeli settlement within the occupied West Bank. He additionally introduced a brand new coverage permitting settlement merchandise exported to the US to be labeled “made in Israel” and a brand new initiative to fight the Palestinian-led worldwide boycott motion.

Christian Zionism is a perception by some Christians that the return of the Jews to the Holy Land and the institution of the state of Israel in 1948 had been in accordance with biblical prophecy.

The Friends of Zion Museum was based by Mike Evans, a distinguished evangelical supporter of Israel. Evangelical Christians are amongst President Donald Trump’s most loyal supporters and have hailed his unprecedented help for Israel. They would even be an essential constituency ought to Pompeo pursue elected workplace following Trump’s presidency.

Pompeo didn’t ship any public remarks on the museum and departed Israel noon.

The Trump administration has damaged with many years of US coverage to help Israel’s claims to territory seized in conflict and to isolate and weaken the Palestinians.

It moved the US Embassy to contested Jerusalem, adopted the place that settlements usually are not opposite to worldwide regulation, acknowledged Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights — which Pompeo additionally visited on Thursday — and launched a Mideast plan that overwhelmingly favored Israel and was rejected by the Palestinians. It has additionally adopted a “maximum pressure” marketing campaign in opposition to Israel’s archenemy Iran whereas brokering normalization agreements with Arab nations.

The strikes Pompeo introduced Thursday are largely symbolic and may very well be simply reversed by President-elect Joe Biden’s incoming administration. But it was a robust present of help for Israel and its Christian allies.

Israel captured the West Bank and east Jerusalem within the 1967 conflict, territories the Palestinians need for his or her future state. The Palestinians view the settlements as a violation of worldwide regulation and a significant impediment to peace, a place shared by a lot of the worldwide group.

Israel seized the Golan Heights from Syria in the identical conflict and later annexed it. Last yr, the US grew to become the primary nation to acknowledge it as a part of Israel, a place Pompeo reaffirmed throughout his go to to the strategic plateau on Thursday.

Biden is against settlement building and has vowed to undertake a extra evenhanded strategy geared toward reviving peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.