(JTA) — President Donald Trump will meet with the U.S. ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, in Washington, D.C., to discuss the Temple Mount crisis.
The meeting is scheduled for late Monday morning, Haaretz reported. An unnamed White House official told the Israeli newspaper that Friedman was coming to Washington this week “as part of a long-planned trip.”
“In addition to a variety of meetings, he will be meeting with the president, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt tomorrow to discuss the events that transpired in the region over the past two weeks where tensions have recently lowered,” the official told Haaretz.
Friedman reportedly was involved in working to reduce tensions over the increased security measures at the Temple Mount, which ultimately were removed. The metal detectors and other measures were installed after a July 14 attack by three Arab-Israeli men that left two Druze-Israeli police officers dead.
Greenblatt, Trump’s special envoy for international relations, also visited Israel last week, also in a bid to help lower the tensions at the Temple Mount.
Both men last week visited the shiva for three members of the Salomon family who were killed by a Palestinian assailant as they sat at their Shabbat table in the West Bank settlement of Halamish celebrating the birth of a baby boy in the family. Friedman also visited the families of the Israel Police officers killed on the Temple Mount.
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