Netanyahu slams ‘false’ Fox News report that he told Trump not to move embassy

The Prime Minister’s Office categorically denied a claim by a Fox News correspondent that Netanyahu had asked Trump not to move the US embassy to Jerusalem.

“The claims posted by a Fox News correspondent are false,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated in response to claims by Fox News journalist Conor Powell in a Monday afternoon report.

“Everyone I’ve spoken to in DC that has been briefed on #Jerusalem embassy move says #Netanyahu told #Trump not to move embassy at this time,” Powell tweeted.

Netanyahu vehemently denies the report.

In a statement to the media Monday evening, summarizing Netanyahu’s meetings with President Donald Trump on February 17 at the Oval Office, the Prime Minister’s Office said that “as for moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, “the PM supports moving it.”

At a “lunch meeting at the White House, “the PM was asked about the embassy and explained [that moving it] would not lead to bloodshed in the region, as some were trying to intimidate [President Trump] into believing.”

Furthermore, during a meeting between  Israeli Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer and then-National Security Adviser-designate Michael Flynn on January 16, “[Dermer] explained why moving the embassy would help advance peace and not the opposite.”

“This would send the message that we are in Jerusalem to stay,” the GPO statement continued. “Moving the embassy would force the other side to contend with the lie they’ve constructed – that Israel has no connection to Jerusalem – and will cause them to understand that Israel will be here forever with Jerusalem as its capital.”

“This is the clear and consistent position of Prime Minister Netanyahu, which he reiterated today,” the statement concluded.

By: Adina Katz, World Israel News

Embassy moveFox NewsJerusalemNetanyahuUS-Israel relations