US closes Office of Palestinian Affairs, dedicated channel to Washington

The United States has officially closed its Office of Palestinian Affairs in Jerusalem, according to an internal state department memo seen by the Guardian, in effect eliminating the Palestinians’ dedicated diplomatic channel to Washington.

The closure, which took effect on Friday, follows through on the secretary of state Marco Rubio’s announcement earlier this month that the office would be merged into the US embassy in Jerusalem.

“Please be advised that the OFFICE OF PALESTINIAN AFFAIRS JERUSALEM, USOFFICE, will be closing at the end of the day on Friday, May 16, 2025,” the memo said.

The quick shuttering comes just as Israel acts on plans to expand its military operations in Gaza that have killed hundreds of Palestinians over recent days. More than 100 Palestinians were killed on Friday, and on Monday, Gaza’s health ministry said 136 people had been killed by Israeli strikes in the last 24 hours, driving the total death toll to nearly 53,500. Hamas took about 250 hostages during its October 2023 attack on Israel, which killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians.

“This decision will restore the first Trump term framework of a unified US diplomatic mission in Israel’s capital that reports to the US ambassador to Israel,” Tammy Bruce, a state department spokesperson, said in the beginning of the month, though she insisted the move “is not a reflection on any outreach or commitment to outreach to the people at the West Bank or to Gaza”.

The state department did not return a request for comment.

The office’s dissolution follows the confirmed talks between Hamas officials and the US administration regarding a Gaza ceasefire and humanitarian aid – negotiations credited with securing the recent release of the captive Israeli-American IDF soldier Edan Alexander.

Established in 2022, the now defunct office had represented Washington’s primary engagement mechanism with the occupied West Bank and Gaza, employing two dozen Americans alongside 75 local staff. Its closure means Palestinian affairs will now be handled without a separate, specialized diplomatic office.

Instead, the department will operate under the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, who has openly dismissed Palestinian identity, once stating: “There’s really no such thing as a Palestinian.”

The closure represents the culmination of a systematic downgrading of US-Palestinian relations that began during Trump’s first term when he shuttered the Jerusalem consulate that had provided Palestinians direct access to Washington without Israeli mediation. But even under the Biden administration, the office has been effectively sidelined throughout the war in Gaza.

“We don’t have a policy on Palestine,” Mike Casey, the state department’s former deputy political counselor on Gaza, told the Guardian in December. “We just do what the Israelis want us to do.”