President Donald Trump has released his long delayed Israeli-Palestinian peace plan, promising “a new dawn,” but angry Palestinians called it biased and deserving to go in the “dustbin of history.”
Standing alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the White House’s East Room, Trump said on Tuesday that his plan could succeed where decades of previous US attempts to intervene had failed.
“Together we can bring about a... New dawn in the Middle East,” Trump said to an enthusiastic audience that included throngs of Israeli and Jewish American guests — but apparently no Palestinian representatives.
They are flat out rejecting the plan, which grants Israel much of what it has sought in decades of international diplomacy, namely control over Jerusalem as its “undivided” capital, rather than a city to share with the Palestinians. The plan also lets Israel annex West Bank settlements.
Trump praised Israel for taking “a giant step toward peace” with the plan, which lays out a vision for future Palestinian statehood if a series of strict conditions are met.
These include requiring the future Palestinian state to be “demilitarised,” while formalising Israeli sovereignty over settlements built in occupied territory.