Washington (AFP) – US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will offer robust support to Israel on a trip timed before French-led moves for a Palestinian state, the State Department said Friday, despite US unease over Israel’s airstrike in Qatar.

President Donald Trump will meet over dinner with Qatar’s prime minister on Friday, the White House said, after he gently chided Israel for the attack Tuesday on Hamas in Qatar, a key US military and diplomatic partner.

But Rubio, who met separately at the White House with Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, will go ahead and leave Saturday for Israel.

He will speak to Israel leaders about “our commitment to fight anti-Israel actions including unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state that rewards Hamas terrorism,” State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said in a statement.

The State Department said only that Rubio would discuss “operational goals and objectives” with Israel and show “the US commitment to Israeli security.”

“He will also emphasize our shared goals: ensuring Hamas never rules over Gaza again and bringing all the hostages home,” Pigott said, adding that Rubio will meet families of hostages.

The statement made no mention of the strikes in Qatar, in which Israel targeted Hamas leaders gathering to discuss a new ceasefire proposal put forward by the Trump administration.

Trump called the attack unfortunate and said that the United States found out too late to stop it.

The State Department did not immediately confirm reports that Rubio would take part in the inauguration of a new tunnel in Jerusalem’s Old City for visitors approaching the Temple Mount, the holiest site for Jews, which is also sacred for Muslims as the Al-Aqsa compound.

“Rubio’s visit is nothing less than American recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the most sensitive part of Jerusalem’s Holy Basin, contradicting Washington’s long-standing position since 1967,” anti-settlement advocacy group Peace Now said in a statement.

Israel seized East Jerusalem in the 1967 war and later annexed it and declared Jerusalem its indivisible capital, a step not recognized by most of the world.

But Trump during his first term bucked the international consensus and moved the US embassy to Jerusalem.

The Trump administration has declined to criticize ramped-up Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank. Netanyahu vowed Thursday there would be no Palestinian state and “this place belongs to us” at a signing ceremony for a major settlement project.

But Netanyahu has walked back from far-right calls for a wide annexation of the West Bank after warnings by the United Arab Emirates, which took the landmark step five years ago of normalizing with Israel.