Theguardian--  The issue of how best to respond to Trump’s announcement is at the centre of a series of emergency meetings of senior Palestinian leaders, which began on Saturday. They are expected to conclude early next week with a rare meeting of the PLO central council, and have already concluded that Abbas should not meet vice president Mike Pence when he visits Israel and Palestine just before Christmas.

Confirming the decision that Abbas would not meet Pence, Riyad al-Maliki said Palestinians would also seek votes on resolutions at the UN security council and Arab League. Although the US has a veto on the security council, support for drafting a resolution would be seen as pressuring the US.

Palestinians have been caught between anxiety to avoid an escalation of violence, amid calls by some for a new intifada – or uprising – and need to make a meaningful response.

Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and France’s Emmanuel Macron agreed they would work together to try to persuade the United States to reconsider its decision, following a phone call focusing on the risks to stability in the region.

The conversation between Erdoğan and Macron followed hard on the heels of a meeting of the UN security council in which an isolated US struggled to defend accusations from European countries that its action was in breach of UN resolutions.