Pompeo becomes 1st secretary of state to visit Israeli settlement in West Bank

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday visited an Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank and became the first U.S. secretary of state ever to do so.

Pompeo during his trip visited the Psagot Winery, and he plans to visit the Golan Heights later in the day, NBC News reports. He previously met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Bahraini Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani in Jerusalem.

The visit comes after Pompeo in 2019 said that "the establishment of Israeli civilian settlements is not, per se, inconsistent with international law," in spite of international consensus. This was a reversal for the U.S., as a State Department legal opinion in 1978 said that Israeli settlements in the West Bank were "inconsistent with international law," NBC reports. Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh criticized Pompeo's trip to "the illegal settlement," saying it sets a "dangerous precedent."

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Pompeo during the trip announced that the United States will regard the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement "as anti-Semitic" and work to "withdraw U.S. government support for" any groups that engage with it, also saying that products made from Israeli settlements can be labeled as "Made in Israel," another policy reversal, The Associated Press reports.

With this trip, Reuters wrote that Trump administration was offering a "parting show of solidarity with" Netanyahu, while NBC reported that the trip was "widely seen as the Pompeo's last play to the Republicans' evangelical base."