Israeli President Isaac Herzog will make the first official visit by an Israeli head of state to Jordan on Wednesday, officials said.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including Israel’s nearly 55-year-old occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, has long weighed on relations between Israel and Jordan, many of whose 10 million citizens are of Palestinian origin.
The planned meeting between Herzog and King Abdullah follows talks the Jordanian monarch held with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank on Monday in an apparent attempt to lower tensions before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, Reuters reported.
Last year, clashes erupted between Israeli police and Palestinians around Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque at the height of the Ramadan fasting month, violence that helped ignite an 11-day war in May between Gaza militants and Israel.
In a statement, a spokesman for Herzog said issues to be raised at the royal palace include “deepening Israeli-Jordanian relations, maintaining regional stability, with an emphasis on the upcoming holiday period, [and] strengthening peace and normalization.”
King Hussein, Abdullah’s late father, signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994, after years of covert contacts.
