BRUSSELS: Lebanon's foreign minister on Monday called the U.S. decisions to move its embassy to Jerusalem and to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal policy failures that will lead to more tensions and extremism in the region.
Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil, whose Free Patriotic Movement is aligned with the Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah in parliament, said moving the U.S. embassy in Israel would undermine peace in the Middle East.
"This is a move that will cause more tensions and lead to more extremism in the region," he told Reuters on the sidelines of a conference in Brussels.
"We cannot accept to have any kind of peace while Jerusalem is being kidnapped."
Alongside U. S. President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, he said U. S. moves added to a long list of U. S. policy failures in the region.
"This is another failure," Bassil told Reuters.
"Israel has declared a long time ago that it is seeking anything but peace, but now the United States is backing Israel in its policy of launching wars against the peoples of the region."