News
US plan to declare Jerusalem the capital of two states
Israeli officials are concerned the US plan for Israeli-Palestinian talks will say Jerusalem should be the capital of two states in order to persuade Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas to return to the negotiating table.
According to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth, a high-ranking Israeli official said US President Donald Trump “wants a deal and he’s very serious,” adding that “from the US standpoint, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is relatively easy and ripe for a solution”. The report said the US-led talks will focus on a strategy based on three principles: “Anyone coming to the negotiating table would have to make concessions and there would be no one-sided concessions; anyone leaving the negotiating table would pay a price; and anyone rejecting the draft will risk being put in a weaker position for the next round.”
The PA is refusing to participate in any Washington-led negotiations after President Trump’s decision last December to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and relocate its embassy there. Ron Lauder, who is close to President Trump, met with Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat and Intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Majed Faraj, to try to persuade them to talk with the US administration. The White House said it didn’t send Lauder on its behalf.
No deadline has been set to publish the US plan. In September the Israeli businessman and US resident Haim Saban told Israeli media that the US administration is likely to present its plan by the end of 2018 or early in 2019. US officials told Yedioth Ahronoth that if Republicans lose seats in the US midterm elections this November, Trump is likely to step up the efforts to try to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in order to be able to present a major foreign policy achievement in the 2020 presidential election.
The paper also reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is likely to ask the US to hold off on an announcement about its plan until after the 2019 Israeli elections, as he fears any proposals to share Jerusalem could cause coalition unrest as well as opening him up to political attacks from his right.