President Donald Trump’s national security adviser H.R. McMaster on Tuesday told the audience at an Israel Independence Day celebration in Washington that Trump “does not have time to debate over doctrine,” and would approach the peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority like a businessman, seeking results.
McMaster spoke ahead of the president’s White House meeting on Wednesday with PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. He said Trump’s approach to foreign policy is unconventional, suggesting “the president is not a super-patient man. Some people have described him as disruptive. They’re right. And this is good – good because we can no longer afford to invest in policies that do not advance the interests and values of the United States and our allies.”
Trump told Reuters last week: “There is no reason there’s not peace between Israel and the Palestinians – none whatsoever,” which absolutely confirmed the president’s role as disrupter, mostly because of its disregard for a century and a half of Middle East history.
Abbas, for his part, has visited the palaces of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and King Abdullah II of Jordan, to coordinate positions ahead of his Wednesday meeting in Washington. In mid-April he told a Japanese newspaper that both countries are “stakeholders in any peace process as Egypt shares its border with Gaza and Jordan borders the West Bank. Additionally, Jordan has played an historic role in the holy sites of our capital, Jerusalem. They have both signed peace treaties with Israel and so they have their particular views and interests. We understand them and work in cooperation, sharing information and discussing options and international initiatives.”
“The question though,” Abbas told Asahi Shimbun, “before talking about any peace process, is to create the right environment for peace to come. This will be impossible as far as Israel’s colonial-settlement enterprises continues, meaning the daily theft of natural resources, imposition of obstacles to our free movement within our own country, and with and from the rest of the world, as well as with Israel, the occupying power, violating its own obligations under international law and signed agreements.”
This, in a nutshell, is the Abbas strategy: construct future debates around the legitimacy of Israeli settlements – before any other, more complex and necessarily troubling to the PA, gets raised. The crucial issue to be resolved is geography, all other concerns – the right of return of Arabs to the new Palestinian State; recognition of Israel as a Jewish State; demilitarization of the new state; the status of Jerusalem – are inherently secondary.
It’s a clever approach, requiring Israel, in essence, to sign off on the borders of a new, legitimate Palestinian State, before sitting down to discuss the more “trivial” details. It’s a strategy that has been tried numerous times and failed to cut through Israel’s resistance. Will Abbas manage to convince Trump that this would be the “businessman’s” best approach to a successful deal? Heaven help us, President Trump on occasion has been known to recite the most recent position he has heard on any given topic – and those positions have occasionally been espoused by radio talk show hosts, TV news commentators, and The National Enquirer.
Abbas will push the borders-first principle as hard as he can, and he might get through to President Trump, who has already “requested” that Israel curb its settlements enthusiasm.
“We don’t think that there is an alternative to the two-state solution on the 1967 border,” Abbas told Asahi Shimbun, arguing that the one-state solution necessarily means an apartheid state—mind you, Abbas’ own call for evacuation of the settlements is a bona fide Judenrein policy.
“[…] You want to talk about one state?” the PA Chairman said to Asahi Shimbun, “Let’s talk about full democracy with equal rights. Okay, you think that Israel will ever be a partner for equality with the Palestinians? I don’t think so, their vision is not about that. What we care about is to have a two-state solution, to have a final status agreement on all issues based on international law.”
Oraib Rantawi, director of the Al-Quds Center for Political Studies in Amman, told Arab News he was hoping for an understanding with the Administration on the following: “1967 borders, East Jerusalem as part of the occupied territories, serious negotiations of a settlement freeze, a declared timeline and a clear reference to the [peace] talks.”
Ziad Khalil Abu Zayyad, head of Fatah’s International Relations Department, said “President Trump will have to clarify whether he is supporting a real solution that will end the occupation and make it clear whether the US Embassy will be moved to Jerusalem or not — such an action will affect the peace process and the attempts to revive it dramatically.”
The latter is an astute observation. President Trump is expected to visit Jerusalem this month, perhaps even on Jerusalem Liberation day, May 23-24. Should the visit end without a statement on moving the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, it may be time for Israel to prepare for a tough and painful fight with yet another “friendly” White House.