T. Belman. A friend of mine reports : “I’ve been witnessing a flurry of diplomatic helicopters shuttling back and forth between Jerusalem and Ramalah over the past two weeks. That ONLY happens when there are major efforts to move things diplomatically. I’ve been tracking this for the past eight years from my vantage point here in Adam.
“There were some very high ranking US politicians here in the past two weeks. Lindsy Graham, Jason Greenblatt, John Balton and Nicky Haley come to mind immediately. I suspect they have something to do with all of this.”
Jordanian PM: We won’t accept deal without ‘Palestinian state’
INN.com
Jordanian Prime Minister Omar Razzaz made it clear that Jordan would not accept a deal that would not include a “Palestinian state.”
In a meeting with PA “Prime Minister” Muhmad Ashtiyeh, Razzaz said that Jordan would not accept any deal or solution that would “end the occupation and lead to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.”
Greenblatt: We’re not looking for regime change within PA
Ben Ariel, 09/07/19 06:08
US special envoy for Mideast peace negotiations Jason Greenblatt said on Monday that the Trump administration is not seeking “regime change” within the Palestinian Authority (PA).
“Our plan right now is with President [Mahmoud] Abbas. We’re not looking for any type of regime change,” Greenblatt told the Christians United for Israel’s (CUFI) annual summit in Washington, DC, according to JNS.
Greenblatt said there is a Palestinian government each in Judea and Samaria, controlled by the Palestinian Authority, and Gaza, which is run by the terrorist group Hamas.
“We have to deal with everybody to make this work,” he added. “We cannot make a comprehensive peace unless we make sure that we are dealing with the representatives of all the Palestinian people.”
Greenblatt did not give a specific timeline regarding when the political component of the administration’s Middle East peace plan will be released.
The US administration released the economic component of the peace plan two weeks ago at an economic workshop in Bahrain which the PA chose to boycott.
White House senior adviser Jared Kushner later criticized the PA leadership for boycotting the Bahrain conference but also pointed out that the US respects Abbas, saying, “I believe in his heart he wants to make peace, and that we can give him an opportunity to try to achieve that.”
In his remarks at CUFI, Greenblatt also blasted the PA for boycotting the economic summit.
At the same time, he added that the dispute between Israelis and Palestinians is a “small conflict in the region” as Iran is the “real threat” to Middle East peace.
“It’s not the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I know people like to say that that’s the core conflict of the region. That’s a small conflict in the region,” he said, according to JNS.
“The real issue is Iran, and every leader there believes that under President Trump we have a chance of potentially solving the Iran issue.”
Finally, Greenblatt criticized the PA for rebuking his attendance at the festive unveiling of, in Jerusalem’s City of David, a section of the ancient road that served as the main thoroughfare between the Shiloah Pool, where pilgrims would ritually purify themselves, and the Second Temple.
“We were accused of Judaizing the city. We will not tolerate that kind of language,” said Greenblatt. “I know that’s been tolerated before. But under President Trump, we will push back. … No matter the criticism leveled against us, we will push back on it time and time again.
You cannot possibly build peace without a foundation of truth. And for somebody to suggest that this tunnel is not truth, they need to be corrected.”
Report: PA reconsidering boycott of US
Elad Benari, 09/07/19 00:34
Israel Hayom newspaper reports that the Palestinian Authority is trying to straighten things out with Trump administration.
Palestinian Authority (PA) officials are re-thinking their boycott of the US administration, the Israel Hayom newspaper reports.
A senior official in Ramallah told the newspaper that mutual messages have been sent recently between Ramallah and Washington in order to straighten things out and end PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ boycott of President Donald Trump and his representatives – Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner and special envoy Jason Greenblatt. The PA has been boycotting the US since December of 2017, when Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
According to the source, a delegation of senior officials from Ramallah headed by Majid Faraj, head of the PA security services, is expected to depart for Washington soon for discussions with senior US officials, and that secret contacts and talks have recently taken place between Trump’s associates and Abbas’ associates.
“The two sides have presented a positive attitude and progress has been made towards the possibility of renewing relations,” the senior PA official told Israel Hayom.
According to the report, one reason for the PA’s change of heart could be its disappointment with the Arab countries which agreed to participate in the US-led Bahrain conference, despite Abbas’ pleas to boycott it. Given that one of the goals of the conference was to exert pressure on Abbas to end the boycott, it seems that the move succeeded.
\
Another reason is the assessment in Ramallah that the political aspect of the “Deal of the Century” will be unveiled after the elections and the establishment of a government in Israel, and the Palestinian Arabs are interested in stabilizing relations with President Trump and his people before that happens.
Proof of the thaw in the relationship between Ramallah and Washington was evident in an extensive interview given by Greenblatt to the Ramallah-based newspaper Al-Ayyam on Monday. “Greenblatt and Friedman are persona non-grata in the PA, and the interview with Greenblatt is intended to soften the Palestinian public’s position towards returning to the negotiating track and accepting the Trump administration as an intermediary between us and Israel,” a close associate of Abbas told Israel Hayom.
In the interview with Al-Ayyam, Greenblatt said, “President Trump has not yet decided when the full peace plan will be published. He is weighing the options based on the Israeli elections and the decision to publish the plan will be made soon.”
Greenblatt noted that Trump and his administration are aware of the difficulties in the “Deal of the Century”, but are determined to move forward with the regional peace plan.
“We are not surprised by the difficulties in the peace plan and by the fact that there are those who do not accept it. Those who do not understand it do not understand the nature of the conflict. At the same time, all the parties must understand that it is impossible to present a perfect plan. We have to sit together and talk about the issues and obstacles in negotiations so that there will be an agreement,” added the US envoy.
Greenblatt did not spare the PA leadership from criticism and told the Ramallah-based newspaper,
“The Palestinian leadership must internalize that the success of the conference in Bahrain shows that there are those who believe in peace and in the ability of the Palestinian people to create a good and prosperous economy with the help of many investors. This is an opportunity that the Palestinian leadership must not miss.”
At the same time, he stressed that Trump does not intend to “impose his positions on Ramallah or buy the Palestinians with money.”
“If there is a peace agreement, the Palestinians will have a dream economy, because we believe that without a serious economic plan that includes investments and various projects, there will be no feasibility for a successful peace agreement,” explained Greenblatt.
(From Debka Weekly- Paid Subscription, last Fri. Addition)
Trump Acts to Salvage Bahrain, Netanyahu to Rescue the Palestinian Authority
The Trump administration is working overtime to somehow salvage the economic prosperity conference staged by the president’s adviser Jared Kushner at Manama, Bahrain last week, after it failed to advance by an iota the Trump peace plans for Israel and the Palestinians. Although the US program for boosting the economies of the Palestinians and supportive Arab nations was greeted with extreme skepticism, it is still going forward.
DEBKA Weekly reports from Washington, that five to seven international working teams for the application of the elements of the Kushner program are being formed of Arab and international business entities. Each is to be assigned a specific subject, which are still to be determined.
The Palestinians remain adamantly opposed to any part of the Trump Middle East peace plan and have opted out of all related events. Nevertheless, the Trump administration has not given up trying to bring them around.
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is also engaged in some quiet salvage work with the Palestinian Authority and its chairman Mahmoud Abbas. Last year, he cut off money transfers to the PA until such time as Ramallah stopped paying stipends to convicted Palestinian terrorists and their families. Abbas stuck to his guns and preferred to let the Palestinian economy go bust rather than giving in to the Israeli ultimatum.
This week, Netanyahu quietly admitted his tactic had failed. To save the Palestinian Authority from total collapse without losing face, the prime minister ordered the fuel tax on supplies to the Palestinian Authority to be dropped. This step releases around $50-55 m per month.
Under previous arrangements these taxes were ultimately refunded to the Palestinian Authority through the clearance revenue transfer, which Netanyahu had stopped. Since the cutoff of Israel’s regular transfers, the PA has been borrowing $50 m from banks every month to partially cover salaries. It has now reached its debt limit. Qatar also
stepped in this month with $25 million out of its $50 million grant. The PA received another $25 million from the $250 million loan approved by Qatar. It is now able to cover 60 percent of its payroll in both the West Bank and Gaza.
@ Adam Dalgliesh:Security cooperation is ongoing as the PA Security informs on mostly Hamas members which leads to arrests of terrorists. The Shabak and IDF almost nightly go into PA areas to arrest terrorists mostly with the cooperation of the PA security apparatus.
You are absolutely correct that the PA pays terrorists. They play a double game. They also incite terrorism. Then when riots break out occasionally they PA security may just put down the riots.
You are funny you are the one who has forever been saying if Israel implemented Sherman’s humane concepts that the UK would send armies to attack Israel and the world would boycott Israel. Yet Bibi’s policies are what your non-action advocated policies look like. Very careful and very slow to act except on the Iranian/Hezbollah front.
The IDF has hit in Syria over 200 times against Iran and Hezbollah it has been reported. This is basically an undeclared intermittent war. This war has also reached Iran in a clandestine manner it has been rumored.
@ Bear Klein: What security cooperation, Bear? Paying terrorists who have “successf
ugly” killed Israelis generous salaries, pension benefits, and support payments for relatives cannot be called security cooperation.
One theory as to why Bibi tolerates the Abbas regimes terrorism is that he is afraid the Europeans will impose retaliatory sanctions on Israel if Israel sanctions the PA “State of Palestine.” Bibi seems to feel diplomacy and trade will in time solve all of Israel’s problems, and that Israel can tolerate a certain level of terrorism. Traffic accidents cause more deaths, as many people have pointed out. But I think it is a short-sighted policy. It is causing the communities near Gaza to be abandoned, vast damage to Israeli agriculture and forestry., widespread traumatic stress disorders. And it gives the terrorists time and the material means to prepare a major, all-out attack that could kill thousands of Israelis.
@ Adam DalglieshBibi has forever been for managing the conflict. He wants to leverage Abbas into maintaining the security cooperation. If he can not manage him and the security situation then he will take him down. He proceeds way too slowly and tries to manage the conflict.
It is the Israelis, not Trump, that is the problem. Cuting th PLOs tax obligations to generate revenue for them is crazy. Why is Bibi so eager to bail out the PLO? Why not just let them fail? Or at least, why not “accept” their refusal to accept continued payments from Israel? Why ask the Europeans to give the PLO financial aid? Why double the number of workers from Gaza given work permits to work in Israel, even as Hamas continues to wage war on Israel, why allow Qatar to pay the salaries of Hamas “officials,” most of whom are terrorists?
Unlike many other posters on Israpundit, I have always acknowledged that Israel may need to proceed cautiously in its counter-terrorist measures, in order to avoid provoking economic sanctions and arms embargoes from some of Israel’s major trading partners. Most of Israel’s trading partners are prejudiced against it and even Jews generally, and are eager to appease the Arab and Muslim blocs by adopting anti-Israel positions. However, Bibi’s appeasement policies toward the Palestinian and Lebanese terrorists go far beyond what is necessary to avoid conflicts with the Europeans and other non-Muslim governments. Bibi and other Israeli political and military are the real obstacle to victory over the terrorists, not Trump, not the Europeans, not even the Russians. There are probably limits to how far Israel’s trading partners are willing to go in punishing Israel for taking tough measures to force an end to the terroists attacks, and the subsidies paid to the terrorists. It may be that they will express verbal indignation, but nothing worse. But there seems to be no limit to Bibi’s determination to appease the terrorists. The same has been true of every Israeli government since Yitshak Shamir of blessed memory was forced out of office in 1992. Madness! Madness!