Fatah vows fresh protests and shuns US Vice President over Jerusalem move

RAMALLAH:  Fatah called on Palestinians to keep up their demonstrations over Washington´s policy shift on Jerusalem as the movement confirmed its leader will refuse to meet with US Vice President later this month in protest at the controversial decision.

After protests gripped the West Bank and Gaza for a third straight day, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was due in Paris on Sunday where demonstrators had rallied on the eve of his arrival.

Arab League ministers, meeting in an emergency meeting in Cairo late Saturday, meanwhile urged Washington to rescind its Jerusalem decision.

President Donald Trump´s decision on Wednesday to recognise Jerusalem as Israel´s capital upended decades of American diplomacy, causing an overwhelming global diplomatic backlash.

Four Palestinians have now been killed and dozens wounded since Trump announced the new policy, which drew criticism from every other UN Security Council member at an emergency meeting on Friday.

In a statement Fatah urged Palestinians to "keep up confrontation and broaden it to all points where the Israeli army is present" in the West Bank.

Its leader -- Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas -- also became the latest influential Arab figure to pull out of talks with Pence who will travel to the region later this month.

"There will be no meeting with the vice president of America in Palestine," Abbas´s diplomatic adviser Majdi al-Khaldi told AFP.

"The United States has crossed all the red lines with the Jerusalem decision."

Egypt´s Coptic Pope Tawadros II also cancelled a meeting with Pence, saying Trump´s announcement had failed to take into account the "feelings of millions" of Arabs.

Ahmed al-Tayeb who heads Al-Azhar, Egypt´s top Sunni Muslim institution, has also pulled out of a planned meet.