Trump plan for Israel-Jordan-Egypt negotiations hits brick wall
President Trump’s self-styled deal of the century aimed at resolving the 100 years-old Arab-Jewish conflict has now been postponed beyond February for a further unspecified period of months – signalling Jordan and Egypt are still refusing to step up and negotiate with Israel on Trump’s plan.
Jordan and Egypt – having respectively signed peace agreements with Israel in 1994 and 1979 – were the last two Arab states to occupy Judea and Samaria (West Bank), East Jerusalem and Gaza (“the disputed territories”) between 1948 and 1967. Both are eminently qualified to replace the Palestine Liberation Organisation which has flatly refused– sight unseen – to negotiate with Israel on Trump’s proposals to resolve the allocation of sovereignty in the disputed territories.
Trump’s plan will be stillborn unless Arab interlocutors indicate in advance that they stand ready to take up the challenge presented by Trump’s ideas and agree to meet with Israel to try and reach a deal acceptable to both Arabs and Jews.
America’s ambassador to Israel – David Friedman – revealed that the upcoming Israeli elections in April were a factor – but not the only factor – that led to the latest postponement of Trump’s long-awaited peace plan.
Friedman said the White House wanted to release the plan in a way that gave it the best chance of getting a good reception. Friedman noted additional“wordsmithing and smoothing” was still required before it was publicized.
Friedman added:
“The challenge to a peace plan is making the case for a much more sober assessment of the realities in this region. The last time there was a meaningful agreement between the Israelis and the Palestinians was 1993 [Ed – The Oslo Accords]. A lot has happened since 1993”
Friedman’s comments came during a joint media conference held in Jerusalem alongside US National Security Adviser John Bolton.
Bolton had seen General Jim Mattis resign as Secretary of Defence in December. Since 2013Mattis had strongly supported the two-state solution – the creation of an additional Arab state between Israel and Jordan – contemplated by both the Oslo Accords and President Bush’s 2003 Roadmap, and unsuccessfully pushed for eight years by President Obama and his Secretaries for State – Hilary Clinton and John Kerry.
Bolton’s opposing opinion held since 2009was reconfirmed to Eric Shawn on 21 January 2018:
“I hope at some point the Administration recognizes and perhaps it is already quietly – that the two-state solution isn’t going anywhere. If anything I would say to King Abdullah of Jordan – “Be prepared to reassert Jordanian sovereignty over part of the West Bank – negotiate with Israel”. I think that’s a far better outcome than the continued pursuit of a mythical – I believe – unattainable viable Palestinian state”
Twelve months down the track Bolton’s Jordan approach has seemingly prevailed – especially after Friedman’s assertion last September:
“Since 1994, the United States has thrown more than $10 billion in humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. Without minimizing the importance of medical treatment and quality education for children — and we don’t minimize that, not even for a minute — we found that these expenditures were bringing the region no closer to peace or stability, not even by a millimetre. To spend hard-earned taxpayer dollars to fund stipends to terrorists and their families, to expend funds to perpetuate rather than to mitigate refugee status, and to finance hate-filled textbooks — I ask you, how does that provide value to the United States or the region?
Friedman’s “wordsmithing and smoothing” comment indicates that Jordan and Egypt could be holding out for further American financial and security guarantees before agreeing to negotiate with Israel.
Trump’s legendary negotiating skills – and patience – are being seriously tested.
David Singer is a Sydney lawyer and foundation member of the International Analysts Network
Author’s note: The cartoon — commissioned exclusively for this article — is by Yaakov Kirschen aka “Dry Bones”- one of Israel’s foremost political and social commentators — whose cartoons have graced the columns of Israeli and international media publications for decades. His cartoons can be viewed at Drybonesblog
Neither Jordan nor Egypt are prepared to break with the Arab/mohammedan bloc to weaken the jihad being waged against Israel primarily by the PA and Hamas.
The reoccupation of Judea and Samaria by a weak and hostile Jordan is sheer lunacy. Bolton’s idea is a second rate two-state mirage.
All Israel has to do is to act like a sovereign nation and claim the rewards of winning defensive wars, the more so as its offers of peace have been consistently rejected and the only meaningful agreement (Oslo 1 & 2) were made in bad faith by the PA and constantly violated by the Fakestinians.
Enough is enough. Israel should finance the resettlement of any resident of Israel and the territories the Arabs seek as stage one of their reconquest and thus rid itself of a fifth column. If it was OK for the Czechoslovakians to get rid of the Sudetenland Germans, the USSR of the Volga Germans and the “Palestinian’s” brothers to kick them out of Kuwait, it is OK for Israel to kick out those among its minority which is hostile and identifies with its jihadi enemies.