US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has disagreed with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the growing ties between Tel Aviv and Beijing despite the huge dose of support that Washington gave him this week.
“China's investment in Israel could undermine intelligence-sharing and other cooperation" between the United States and Israel, Pompeo warned in an interview aired on Thursday on Israel’s Channel 13.
"If certain systems go in certain places, then America’s efforts to work alongside you will be more difficult, and in some cases, we won’t be able to do so,” he told the station.
Tel Aviv has in recent years consolidated its economic and trade relations with China by tasking several Chinese companies with executing strategic infrastructure projects in Israel.
The US administration is mainly worried about a lease agreement that could allow a Chinese firm to manage Haifa port where US Navy ships dock when operating in the eastern Mediterranean.
“When China behaves transparently, when China is engaged in real economic transactions, we are untroubled,” Pompeo said. “When China engages in spying through its commercial state-owned enterprises and presents risk through its technology systems — companies like Huawei which present real risk to the people of Israel — when those things happen, we want to make sure that countries know about it, know the risks, and then countries will make their own sovereign decisions.”
His warnings came on the same day that the US made an unprecedented show of support for Israel, effectively recognizing its sovereignty on the Golan Heights.
US President Donald Trump's announcement coincided with a trip by Pompeo to Jerusalem, where he became the first high-ranking American official to visit the Western Wall alongside an Israeli prime minister -- another boost for Netanyahu.
