Palestinians say 'no clear vision' from Trump on peace talks

Palestinian officials await a 'clear vision' from the US on resuming negotiations with Israel, with President Abbas saying chaos in the White House is affecting efforts for peace.

MENA

2 min read

The New Arab

21 August, 2017

Palestinians say there is no 'clear vision' from the US on peace talks. [Getty]

Palestinian officials are still waiting for a "clear vision" from Washington on resuming negotiations with Israel, with President Mahmoud Abbas saying chaos in the White House is affecting US efforts for peace.

Washington announced last week that it would send a US delegation of top envoys Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt and deputy national security advisor Dina Powell to the Middle East to discuss peace talks.

Trump ordered the US delegation to focus on a path to "substantive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks", but ambiguity around the two-state solution and bias towards Israel has left confidence low among the Palestinian leadership.

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a spokesman for Abbas, said this weekend that the Palestinians "want clarity" on the two-state solution and are waiting for a "clear vision" from the US on how to advance the peace process.

Senior Palestinian official, Ahmed Majdalani, told the Voice of Palestine that there are no signs the US delegation to Palestine will make any progress in breaking the deadlock in peace talks.

The US negotiations team has so far only focused on minor issues in the conflict, he added, and not attempted to tackle key final status issues such as settlements or borders.

President Abbas, who met with Israeli MPs from the Meretz Party on Sunday, told the vising delegation that disarray in the White House is hindering efforts to relaunch peace talks, which have been frozen since talks collapsed in 2014.

"I don't even know how they are dealing with us, because his entire administration is in chaos," Abbas told the Israeli politicians, according to The Times of Israel.

The Palestinian president told the visiting MPs that he had met with US officials more than 20 times since Trump's election last year, but said he still had no idea what their plans for peace talks were.

Earlier this year, Trump broke with decades of US foreign policy by announcing peace between Israel and the Palestinians may not come in the form of a two-state solution.

Jared Kushner, who was appointed to restart Israeli-Palestinians negotiations, has so far made little progress, with Palestinian officials accusing his team of sounding like "Netanyahu's advisers".

Agencies contributed to this report.