More injured as Palestinian protests continue after US Jerusalem decision

Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas will refuse to meet US Vice President Mike Pence later this month following Washington's controversial policy shift on Jerusalem, an aide said on Saturday, as protests gripped the Palestinian territories.

Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip killed at least two people and wounded at least 25 others including women and children as protests continued over US President Donald Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital on Wednesday.

At least four people have been killed and dozens wounded since Trump announced the move, which drew criticism from every other UN Security Council member at an emergency meeting on Friday.

Protests continued illegally-occupied East Jerusalem and other parts of illegally-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip as Israeli police used live ammunition, rubber-coated steel bullets and tear gas to disperse demonstrators.

TRT World's Iolo ap Dafydd reports from Palestine's capital of East Jerusalem.

Pence unwelcome 

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

"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, with the church saying it "declines to receive" him in protest at Trump's announcement which failed to take into account the "feelings of millions" of Arabs.

On Friday, Ahmed al-Tayeb who heads Al-Azhar, Egypt's top Sunni Muslim institution, also scrapped plans to meet Pence over the "unjust and unfair American decision on Jerusalem".

Fresh protests

There were fresh clashes on the second day in the occupied East Jerusalem, occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip as Palestinian protesters came out to voice their anger over Trump's announcement.

Police used almost all means to suppress protests, including, arresting the demonstrators. 

TRT World spoke to Ramallah-based journalist Mohannad Alami.

Gaza

Mourners vented their anger at the funerals of two people killed during clashes at the border fence on Friday and two Hamas members killed early on Saturday.

Police said they arrested two young men from the Israeli-Arab town of Arara.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said 171 people were hurt in the occupied West Bank and 60 in Gaza Saturday, with injuries ranging from gunshot wounds to tear gas inhalation and being beaten by Israeli security forces.

In illegally-occupied East Jerusalem, police fired stun grenades to disperse Palestinian demonstrators on the main Salahedin Street.

An Israeli police statement said four policemen were slightly injured and 13 protesters arrested.

The Red Crescent said 12 Palestinians were injured by shrapnel from grenades or by blows from police.

Third intifada 

There have been fears of a much larger escalation of violence after Hamas leader Ismail Haniya called for a new Palestinian intifada, or uprising.

Hamas and other Islamic groups renewed those calls on Saturday.

Abbas's Fatah organisation urged Palestinians to "keep up confrontation and broaden it to all points where the Israeli army is present" in the West Bank.

Dozens of protesters were wounded by rubber bullets or live fire in clashes in the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem that followed Friday's main weekly Muslim prayers.

Tens of thousands also protested in Muslim and Arab countries, including Jordan, Turkey, Pakistan and Malaysia.

Saturday's pre-dawn air strike on a base of Hamas in Nusseirat in the central Gaza Strip was one of several, the Israeli military said.

It said aircraft "targeted four facilities belonging to the Hamas" a day after what the military said three rocket attacks from the Palestinian enclave into southern Israel.

One rocket hit the southern Israeli town of Sderot, although public radio said it did not explode and did not cause any casualties.

Israel had already responded on Friday with air strikes which the Gaza health ministry said wounded 25 people, including women and children.

The Hamas health ministry in Gaza said the two men killed on Saturday were in the movement's armed wing, which has fought three wars with Israel since 2008.