President Donald Trump is expected to announce Wednesday that the U.S. will recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. | Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images Palestinian envoy: Trump 'is declaring war in the Middle East'

President Donald Trump’s planned decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and move the U.S. Embassy there is “a kiss of death” for a solution to the long-running territorial conflict in the region, Palestine’s envoy to the United Kingdom said Wednesday.

“If he says what he is intending to say about Jerusalem being the capital of Israel, it means a kiss of death to the two-state solution,” Manuel Hassassian told BBC radio on Wednesday in an interview that was picked up by Reuters.


“He is declaring war in the Middle East, he is declaring war against 1.5 billion Muslims (and) hundreds of millions of Christians that are not going to accept the holy shrines to be totally under the hegemony of Israel,” Hassassian said.

Trump is expected to announce Wednesday that the U.S. will recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, a controversial move that makes good on a promise he made during the presidential campaign. It is a step long sought by Israel’s government but opposed by Palestinians, who would also seek to claim Jerusalem as its capital in any two-state solution.

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Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that the U.S. has labeled a terrorist organization, said Tuesday that moving the U.S. Embassy “breaks red lines,” according to The Associated Press. Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of the Palestinian Islamist militant group, said Trump’s decision would ignite “the spark of rage against the occupation."

