Israeli FM: U.S. to recognize Golan Heights as Israeli territory

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Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz tweeted earlier Sunday that U.S. President Donald Trump will sign an official document to recognize Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights when he meets Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington on Monday.

"President Trump will sign tomorrow in the presence of PM Netanyahu an order recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights," Foreign Minister Israel Katz wrote on Twitter.

Trump accepts Israeli sovereignty over Golan Heights

Netanyahu arrived in Washington on Sunday, looking for an electoral boost from Trump amid expectations the U.S. president will formally recognize Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights just days after Trump backed Israel's hold over the occupied Golan Heights.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Sunday that Turkey will take the issue of U.S. recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights to the UN, calling Trump's statement on the Golan Heights is a "gift" to Netanyahu ahead of parliamentary elections set for April, Erdogan said in an interview with local broadcaster TGRT Haber.

Netanyahu, facing possible indictment in three corruption cases and denying any wrongdoing, will play to a domestic audience in highlighting what he hails as the strongest bond ever between an Israeli leader and an American president.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump speak upon the latter's arrival at Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, May 22, 2017. /VCG Photo

Netanyahu can expect a warm reception from his U.S. counterpart Trump.

Trump on Thursday announced that the time had come to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, strategic territory that Israel seized from Syria in the 1967 Middle East war.

The president's move was widely seen in Israel as an attempt to provide an election boost to the right-wing Netanyahu, who had pressed for yet another departure from long-standing U.S. policy in one of the world's most volatile regions.

Senior White House Adviser Ivanka Trump and U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin stand next to the dedication plaque at the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, during the dedication ceremony of the new U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, May 14, 2018. /VCG Photo

Trump had already recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital in 2017 and moved the American embassy to the holy city from Tel Aviv last May.

Seven decades of Israel-Palestine turmoil to be marked with US Embassy move

Those steps angered Palestinians, who want East Jerusalem, also captured by Israel in 1967, as the capital of a state in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. It also set them firmly against a peace plan Washington says it will present after the Israeli ballot.

"We have never had such a bond between the prime minister of Israel and an American president," Netanyahu told reporters upon his departure from Tel Aviv.

Close race

Before arriving in Washington on Sunday, Netanyahu said he would speak to Trump "about his historic declaration" on the Golan and "continued pressure on Iran" following the U.S. withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear deal between world powers and Tehran that had relaxed sanctions on Israel's arch-foe.

Netanyahu will also address the pro-Israel lobbying group, AIPAC, at its annual convention in Washington, as will his main challenger in the election, former military chief Benny Gantz who heads a centrist party.

A man walks past a Likud election campaign billboard, depicting U.S. President Donald Trump shaking hands with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in Jerusalem, February 4, 2019. /VCG Photo

The prime minister said he will meet leaders of Congress during the visit. Netanyahu's relations with the Democrats have been strained by his support for Trump, friction with the Democratic party's progressive wing and his thorny relationship with Barack Obama.

Opinions polls show Netanyahu running neck and neck with Gantz.

The political newcomer has called for clean governance, building on the attorney-general's announcement in February that he intends to indict Netanyahu on bribery and fraud charges, pending a hearing after the April 9 vote.

(Cover: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers a statement after a meeting of the Likud party in the Israeli town of Ramat Gan, east of the coastal city of Tel Aviv, February 21, 2019. /VCG Photo)

Source(s): Reuters ,Xinhua News Agency