US Republican presidential candidate John McCain said on Tuesday that he supported Israel’s claim to Jerusalem as the capital of the Jewish state.

“I support Jerusalem as the capital of Israel,” McCain said in Jordan on the latest leg of a visit to the region.

Israel annexed east Jerusalem after seizing it in the Arab-Israeli war in June 1967 and declared it part of its eternal undivided capital, a claim not recognised by the international community.

The Palestinians want to make the eastern part of the Holy City the capital of their future promised state.

The United States, along with other foreign governments, maintains its embassy in Tel Aviv.

McCain, who visited Baghdad and is to go on to Israel also voiced concern at what he said was Iran’s influence in Iraq and its support for the Lebanese Shiite Muslim Hezbollah movement in Lebanon.

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