Abbas Cancels Meeting in Jordan with Biden on War in Israel

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has canceled his meeting with President Biden in Jordan, shortly after the hospital explosion in Gaza that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) concluded was the result of a misfire by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Biden left for Israel on Tuesday aboard Air Force One, and after meeting with Israeli leaders is scheduled to fly to Jordan to meet with King Abdullah II as well as President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, and Abbas. Now Abbas will be a no-show.

Abbas has been the head of the official government of the Palestinian people since 2005. But the reality on the ground is that Hamas operates as it wishes in Gaza, from which the terrorist organization launched the recent attacks that have resulted in over 1,400 deaths in Israel, as well as over 4,399 wounded, with another 200 currently held hostage by the terrorists.

The 87-year-old Abbas canceled the meeting in Jordan shortly after an explosion at a hospital in Gaza took hundreds of lives. Hamas predictably blames the IDF for the explosion. Israel in the meantime immediately made clear that IDF never deliberately targets hospitals, and is currently investigating the source of the explosion, including the likelihood that the explosion came from a misfired rocket from Hamas or Islamic Jihad, which could have detonated explosives stored nearby.