Trump's PLO shutdown paves way for Jordan-West Bank reunification

[Published 27 September 2018]

President Trump’s decision to close the PLO mission in Washington, cancel the visas of the Palestinian Ambassador and his family and order their bank accounts be closed - mark the PLO’s final humiliation for condemning Trump’s proposed peace plan before its contents have even been published.

Strangely however the United States still maintains that direct negotiations between Israel and the PLO are the only way forward.

The PLO will be fortified by this latest statement – mistakenly believing it:

• remains in the box seat to stymie any peace plan Trump wheels out,

• can blunt Trump’s reputation as a highly-successful deal maker and

• reinforces the PLO’s right to continue as sole spokesman for the Palestinian Arabs although Hamas governs Gaza and Jordan exercises sovereignty in 78% of former Palestine.

Direct Israel-PLO negotiations on Trump’s peace proposals are a pipedream.

Jordan remains the key to resolving - with Israel - Trump’s plans involving the future of the West Bank for the following reasons:

• Transjordan occupied the West Bank from 1948 to 1967.

• Transjordan and the West Bank were unified in 1950, the new entity was renamed “Jordan” and Jordanian citizenship was extended to the West Bank Arab population

• Jordan continued to retain legal and administrative control and extend citizenship between 1967 and 1988 until King Hussein announced Jordan’s termination of its role in the West Bank in the PLO’s favour for the following reasons:

“Lately, it has transpired that there is a general Palestinian and Arab orientation which believes in the need to highlight the Palestinian identity in full in all efforts and activities that are related to the Palestine question and its developments. It has also become clear that there is a general conviction that maintaining the legal and administrative links with the West Bank, and the ensuing Jordanian interaction with our Palestinian brothers under occupation through Jordanian institutions in the occupied territories, contradicts this orientation. It is also viewed that these links hamper the Palestinian struggle to gain international support for the Palestinian cause of a people struggling against foreign occupation.

In view of this line of thought, which is certainly inspired by genuine Palestinian will, and Arab determination to support the Palestinian cause, it becomes our duty to be part of this direction, and to respond to its requirements…” …

• Jordan’s retirement from the West Bank moved Abu Iyad – PLO-leader Yassar Arafat’s deputy – to declare on 15 December 1989:

“I say that on the day immediately following the establishment of the Palestinian State, we will begin unity with Jordan. I am not concerned what kind of unity this may be, because we are one people and have the same history. You cannot make a distinction between a Jordanian and a Palestinian. It is true that we encourage unity between Arab peoples, but the relation between Jordan and Palestine in particular is clearly distinctive; all those who tried in the past and are still trying to create divisions between the Jordanian and Palestinian people have failed. We indeed constitute one people… when the Palestinian state and unity is established … The Jordanian will be a Palestinian and the Palestinian a Jordanian”

Reunification of the West Bank with Jordan never required the creation of a second Palestinian Arab State in the West Bank - in addition to Jordan.

Reunification of a large part of the West Bank with Jordan is now once again tantalisingly within Jordan’s grasp following Trump’s spectacular undermining of the PLO after it defiantly refused to negotiate on Trump’s still-unannounced peace plan.

Trump will not be pandering to the PLO and repeating the same mistakes made by former American Presidents.

Author’s note: The cartoon – commissioned exclusively for this article — is by Yaakov Kirschen aka “Dry Bones”- one of Israel’s foremost political and social commentators – whose cartoons have graced the columns of Israeli and international media publications for decades. His cartoons can be viewed at Drybonesblog

Trump squeezes UNRWA, checkmates PLO and incentivises Jordan

[Published 13 September 2018]

President Trump has created a veritable diplomatic tsunami affecting the political fortunes of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), Hamas and Jordan - with his decision to cease all future donations to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) - currently US$360million per annum and comprising about 30% of UNRWA’s budget.

The numbers of UNRWA-registered Palestinian Arab refugees in Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza have been increasing in leaps and bounds annually because they include all the descendants of those Palestinian Arabs caught up in the 1948 and 1967 Arab-Israel wars.

Currently:

(i) 2,175,000 live in Jordan — 370000 of whom reside in 10 camps

(ii) 810000 live in the West Bank — 200000 of whom reside in 19 camps

(iii) 1,300,000 live in Gaza — 580000 of whom reside in 8 camps

UNRWA only provides services to the camps. UNRWA does not administer or police the camps, as this is the responsibility of the host authorities.

Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza comprise 83% of the territory of former Palestine. For UNRWA to count as “refugees” people who are now living in Arab-controlled parts of the same country where their forebears once resided - is really an insult to one’s intelligence.

For UNRWA to tolerate a system of apartheid and segregation that allows those “refugees” to be divided into camp dwellers and non-camp dwellers makes a mockery of the humanitarian principles espoused by the United Nations and the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Struggling under an accumulated deficit of US$271 million before Trump’s hammer blow — UNRWA had already shut down or slated for closure many programs and laid off large numbers of employees — mainly Palestinian Arabs.

The further cuts UNRWA will now be forced to make following America’s defunding will be critical to the PLO, Hamas and Jordan — as “refugees” coming under their respective jurisdictions affected by substantial cuts to their well-established entitlements see others not similarly subjected.

UNRWA funding decisions cannot possibly please all these “refugees” - and those receiving UNRWA aid in Lebanon and Syria.

The PLO, Hamas and Jordan will be lobbying furiously for UNRWA funding cuts to not be made to “refugees” living under their governance. Serious political consequences could ensue if they fail.

Jordan - enjoying a long-standing peace treaty with Israel — currently houses 50% of the total of UNRWA registered Palestinian Arab “refugees” in the West Bank, Gaza and Jordan.

Jordan — 70% of whose population comprises Palestinian Arabs or their descendants formerly living in Palestine west of the Jordan River - is eminently qualified to enter into direct negotiations with Israel to recover territory lost by it in the West Bank to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War.

Successful negotiations would enable Jordan to:

(i) close the 29 refugee camps in Jordan and the West Bank currently housing 570000 “refugees”

(ii) fully rehabilitate and integrate all 2,985,000 “refugees” within the general Arab populations residing in the West Bank and Jordan

(iii) extend Jordanian citizenship to all West Bank Arab residents

Trump’s promise of direct American bilateral assistance to Jordan would facilitate this outcome.

In one fell swoop — Trump has:

(i) Squeezed UNRWA into making refugee-relief choices that could affect the political futures of the PLO, Hamas and Jordan

(ii) Checkmated the PLO’s claim to continue to be the sole spokesman for the Palestinian Arabs because it lacks absolute authority to influence how UNRWA reduces current funding to the Palestinian Arab “refugees” living in Gaza and Jordan

(iii) Incentivised Jordan to fill the diplomatic void left by the PLO by agreeing to begin negotiations with Israel on Trump’s peace plan without any preconditions

Bucking — not backing - Trump is a sure-fire recipe for committing political suicide.

Author’s note:The cartoon — commissioned exclusively for this article — is by Yaakov Kirschen aka “Dry Bones”- one of Israel’s foremost political and social commentators, whose cartoons have graced the columns of Israeli and international media publications for decades. His cartoons can be viewed atDrybonesblog

Jordan's re-entry into West Bank looms large as Trump dumps PLO

[Published 6 September 2018]

Two major developments this past week could see a large part of Judea and Samaria (West Bank) being reunified with Jordan — as existed between 1948 and 1967 - or becoming a Jordanian enclave - under President Trumps’ yet-to-be- announced “ultimate deal” intended to resolve the 100 years-old Arab-Jewish conflict.

Those developments were:

1. Trump immediately stopped all further American financial aid to UNRWA:

The PLO refused to have anything to do with Trump’s slowly-gestating peace proposals after Trump recognised Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in December 2017.

This PLO anti-Trump stance has continued unabated despite US Ambassador to the United Nations — Nikki Haley— publicly warning the PLO last January when asked about future US funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestinian Arab refugees:

“The President has basically said he doesn’t want to give any additional funding, or stop funding, until the Palestinians agree to come back to the negotiation table. We still very much want to have a peace process. Nothing changes with that. The Palestinians now have to show they want to. As of now, they’re not coming to the table, but they ask for aid. We’re not giving the aid. We’re going to make sure that they come to the table.”

This week Trump gave up waiting — ending all future donations to UNRWA including $300 million pledged for this year.

More than 2 million UNRWA registered Palestinian Arab refugees live in Jordan — most of whom have full citizenship. Nearly 370,000 - or 18 per cent—live in 10 refugee camps.

The West Bank has nearly 775,000 UNRWA registered Palestinian Arab refugees - a quarter of who live in 19 camps.

Trump’s proven propensity for financially helping those States that help him achieve his goals could well see a large part of this retired UNRWA funding being redirected to Jordan - if Jordan replaces the PLO and enters into direct negotiations with Israel on finally resolving sovereignty in the West Bank.

2. The PLO announced it had refused Trump’s proposal to create a Jordan-West Bank confederation:

Israel and the PLO have been unable to agree on the creation of an additional Arab State between Israel and Jordan after fruitless negotiations conducted over the last 25 years.

Rejecting a Jordan-West Bank confederation now sees the PLO hoisted by its own petard — leaving Jordan to fill the yawning diplomatic void by stepping in and negotiating with Israel to engineer Jordan’s return to a large part of the West Bank — occupied by Jordan from 1948 until its loss to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War.

Restoring Jordanian citizenship to the West Bank Arab population — as existed between 1950 and 1988 — would once again see parity of rights re-established between the Arab populations spanning both sides of the Jordan River.

The 29 refugee camps in Jordan and the West Bank could be closed and their inhabitants integrated into the general population. “Palestinian refugees” would be relics of the past.

No Arab or Jew living in the West Bank would be forced to move.

Palestinian Arabs residing in other Arab countries could emigrate to this newly-merged Jordan-West Bank entity — which might even choose to rename itself “Palestine” — comprising as it would about 80% of the territory contained in the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine. Israel would end up exercising sovereignty in about 19% - leaving sovereignty in the remaining 1% - Gaza — to be determined by Israel, Jordan and Egypt.

As with any good settlement - no-one would be 100% happy — but 100 years of conflict would be ended and Trump would have pulled off yet another stunning success.

Author’s note: The cartoon — commissioned exclusively for this article — is by Yaakov Kirschen aka “Dry Bones”- one of Israel’s foremost political and social commentators — whose cartoons have graced the columns of Israeli and international media publications for decades. His cartoons can be viewed at Drybonesblog

Trump turns screws as PLO creates fake news on Jerusalem and refugees

[Published 30 August 2018]

President Trump cancelled more than $US200 million in aid to the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) this week - following his earlier decisions:

(i) reducing America’s contribution to the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) by about $US300 million and

(ii) recognising Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moving the US Embassy there.

An infuriated PLO has responded by making the following false claims concerning Jerusalem and aid to refugees in the West Bank and Gaza — which have been uncritically and unquestioningly reported as news:

1. Executive committee member Ahmed Tamimi exclaimed:

“Jerusalem is at the heart of the Palestinian, Arab and Islamic peoples”

This claim contravenes Article 1 of the Palestinian National Charter — which declares:

“Palestine is the homeland of the Arab Palestinian people; it is an indivisible part of the Arab homeland, and the Palestinian people are an integral part of the Arab nation.

Claiming the “Palestinian people” is a separate and distinct people from the “Arab people” - is deceptive and misleading.

Meanwhile - Husam Zomlot - head of the Palestinian General Delegation to the United States - stated:

“After Jerusalem and UNRWA, this (cutting of aid to the PLO) is another confirmation of abandoning the two-state solution and fully embracing Netanyahu’s anti-peace agenda.”

Negotiations to conclude the “two state solution” — the creation of a 22nd Arab state with Jerusalem as its capital - in addition to the Arab state of Jordan created in 78% of former Palestine in 1946 — ended in April 2014 after unsuccessful negotiations spanning 20 years.

Other solutions now need to be explored that should involve Jordan and possibly Egypt negotiating with Israel to return to these two existing Arab states territory once occupied by them in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), East Jerusalem and the Gaza District between 1948 and 1967.

2. Cutting US financial aid to refugees in the West Bank and Gaza

PLO Executive Committee member Hanan Ashrawi declared:

“The rights of the Palestinian people are not for sale. There is no glory in constantly bullying and punishing a people under occupation. The U.S. administration has already demonstrated meanness of spirit in its collusion with the Israeli occupation and its theft of land and resources; now it is exercising economic meanness by punishing the Palestinian victims of this occupation.”

Ashrawi ignored the following facts:
(i) The West Bank currently has 775,000 registered “refugees” - around a quarter of who live in 19 refugee camps - all of which have been under full PLO administrative control since 1993 as designated by the Oslo Accords.

(ii) Gaza has 1.3 million registered “refugees” - of who 500000 currently live in 8 refugee camps — all of which have been under Hamas governance since 2007.

(iii) Many of these camps and their inhabitants date back to 1949. Severe overcrowding problems, high rates of unemployment, personal safety and poor infrastructure are common to them all.

The PLO and Hamas have maintained this discriminatory two-tiered refugee segregation system in both Gaza and the West Bank for at least the last ten years.

The failure to close these camps and integrate their residents into the general Gazan and West Bank Arab populations is a damning indictment of Hamas and the PLO.

Expecting Trump to pick up the tab as these inhumane practices continue for crass political purposes is arrogant and unwarranted.

Trump has made it clear these funds will go to relieving genuine refugee distress in other parts of the world.

Trump turns screws as PLO creates fake news on Jerusalem and refugees

The PLO’s outright refusal to negotiate with Israel on Trump’s long-awaited peace plan - inflamed by these latest false claims — only ensures the PLO’s increasingly-rapid slide into political irrelevance.

Trump anoints Jordan to replace PLO in negotiations with Israel

[Published 22 August 2018]

The three day visit to Israel this week by President Trump’s National Security Advisor — John Bolton — indicates Jordan will replace the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) in concluding negotiations with Israel to resolve territorial sovereignty in Judea and Samaria (West Bank), East Jerusalem and Gaza (“the disputed territories”) under Trump’s peace plan.

Bolton’s visit follows a former Jordanian ambassador - Walid Sadi - last week signalling Jordan is ready to fill the diplomatic void following the breakdown of Israel-PLO negotiations unsuccessfully conducted during the last 25 years. The PLO refuses to negotiate on Trump’s plan.

Walid resurrected Jordan’s long-dormant claims to sovereignty in the disputed territories that completely undermine those of the PLO:

“First of all, the unity of the West Bank with the East Bank was officially and constitutionally adopted on 24 of April 1950. No one disputes this fact. The Constitution of the country at the time was the 1952 Constitution, which stipulated in no uncertain terms that no part of the Kingdom shall be ceded, period. This provision makes the 1988 decision to cut off all legal and administrative relations between the two banks stopping short of ceding the West Bank to any side whatsoever. Any other interpretation of the 1988 political decision is absolutely untenable constitutionally.”

Bolton himself has supported Israel-Jordan negotiations over the West Bank since 2009.

Bolton told Eric Shawn on 21 January 2018:

“I hope at some point the Administration recognizes and perhaps it is already quietly — that the two-state solution isn’t going anywhere. If anything I would say to King Abdullah of Jordan — “Be prepared to reassert Jordanian sovereignty over part of the West Bank — negotiate with Israel”. I think that’s a far better outcome than the continued pursuit of a mythical — I believe — unattainable viable Palestinian state”

George Will — an outspoken critic of President Trump - has claimed:

“Bolton will soon be the second-most dangerous American.”

Yet Will himself had written in the Washington Post on 17 April 1987:

“May 14 will be the 30th Anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel, June 6 will be the 20th anniversary of the Six Day War. The West Bank has been held by Israel longer than it had been held by Jordan, the 1967 aggressor, which ever since has presented itself as the aggrieved party. Today, as every day since 1948, the key to peace is direct negotiations between Jordan and Israel, not a committee”

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been seeking direct negotiations with Jordan for decades — telling the United Nations General Assembly on 11 December 1984:

“Clearly, in Eastern and Western Palestine, there are only two peoples, the Arabs and the Jews. Just as clearly, there are only two states in that area, Jordan and Israel. The Arab State of Jordan, containing some three million Arabs, does not allow a single Jew to live there. It also contains 4/5 of the territory originally allocated by this body’s predecessor, the League of Nations, for the Jewish National Home. The other State, Israel, has a population of over four million, of which one sixth is Arab. It contains less than 1/5 of the territory originally allocated to the Jews under the Mandate…. It cannot be said, therefore, that the Arabs of Palestine are lacking a state of their own. The demand for a second Palestinian Arab State in Western Palestine, and a 22nd Arab State in the world, is merely the latest attempt to push Israel back into the hopelessly vulnerable armistice lines of 1949.”

Two peoples — the Arabs and the Jews - need two states — not three - in former Palestine.

Jordan - Israel negotiations on Trump peace plan set to bypass PLO

[Published 14 August 2018]

Jordan-Israel negotiations based on President Trump’s long-awaited peace plan seem increasingly likely to happen - following retired Jordanian Ambassador and former editor of the Jordan Times – Walid Sadi – flagging Jordan’s legal and sovereignty claims in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and East Jerusalem (“disputed territories”).

Sadi - in an op-ed article in the Jordan Times on 12 August - has forcefully argued that Jordan’s decision to cut off all legal and administrative relations with the disputed territories in July 1988 did not amount to Jordan ceding its claims to sovereignty for the following reasons:

“First of all, the unity of the West Bank with the East Bank was officially and constitutionally adopted on 24 of April 1950. No one disputes this fact. The Constitution of the country at the time was the 1952 Constitution, which stipulated in no uncertain terms that no part of the Kingdom shall be ceded, period. This provision makes the 1988 decision to cut off all legal and administrative relations between the two banks stopping short of ceding the West Bank to any side whatsoever. Any other interpretation of the 1988 political decision is absolutely untenable constitutionally.”

The Jordan Times is published by the Jordan Press Foundation – in which the government-owned Social Security Investment Fund has a majority stake. Wadi’s politically-charged and highly-significant article could only have been published with the knowledge and approval of Jordan’s King Abdullah.

Jordan’s claims are far superior to those of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) – Jordan being the last Arab state to occupy and claim sovereignty (albeit illegally) in the disputed territories from 1948 until their loss to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War.

Indeed the 1964 PLO Charter made no claim to sovereignty in the disputed territories – completely negating any claimed ancient and long-standing rights accruing to their Arab populations which would outweigh the claims by Jordan to these areas - where sovereignty still remains undetermined between Arabs and Jews.

Jordan’s pivotal role in bringing Trump’s peace proposals to a successful conclusion are grounded in the following salient facts:

1. West Bank and East Jerusalem Arabs voted to unify these areas with Transjordan in 1950 and rename the unified entity - “Jordan”

2. West Bank Arabs were citizens of Jordan possessing Jordanian passports between 1950 and 1988.

3. Half the members of the Jordanian Parliament were elected from the West Bank Arab population between 1950 and 1967.

4. Jordan’s population is overwhelmingly comprised of Arabs born east or west of the Jordan River.

5. Jordan itself comprises 78% of the territory of former Palestine

6. Jordan and Israel are the two successor states to the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine already exercising between them mutually-agreed sovereignty in 95% of former Palestine

7. Jordanian custodianship of Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem is guaranteed under the 1994 Israel-Jordan Peace Treaty.

Reunifying into one territorial unit the East Bank with areas of the West Bank allocated to Jordan only requires Israel and Jordan to redraw their already existing internationally-recognised border.

Israeli and Jordanian negotiators – armed only with pencils, sharpeners and erasers - can achieve this new dividing line between their respective states within a relatively short time.

The PLO has made it clear it wants no part in negotiating Trump’s proposals. It – and Hamas - will be left to cool their heels and contemplate the many squandered opportunities to create an additional state between Israel and Jordan since the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993.

Jordan’s decision to resurrect its long-dormant claims after 30 years of studied silence and subservience to PLO posturing should be welcomed by all who want to see the Jewish-Arab conflict ended.

Trump and Israel dabble in Hamas and PLO quicksand

[Published 8 August 2018]

President Trump’s attempt to see a five-year Gaza ceasefire negotiated between Hamas and Israel seems to be an exercise in futility destined to failure.

America’s involvement first surfaced on 7 July when “an unnamed senior Trump administration official” stated:

“We definitely have a Gaza focus right now because the situation is the way it is, and we want to try to help. But it’s not as though we think we need to fix Gaza first before we would air the peace plan.”

If it sounds like a cop-out and looks like a cop-out — it is a cop-out.

The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) had made it very clear months ago it would have nothing to do with Trump’s yet to-be-released peace plan — no matter when it is aired.

Arab States supportive of Trump’s plan were wavering.

Leaving those small technicalities aside - any negotiations between Israel and Hamas over Gaza would be anathema to the PLO - which has been engaged in an internecine struggle with Hamas to govern Gaza since 2007.

Indeed Fatah spokesman Osama Qawasmeh has already reportedly said the number one priority should be achieving Palestinian unity on the basis of previous agreements signed between Hamas and Fatah - and not a truce with Israel in return for humanitarian aid.

Trump’s “ultimate deal” was initially foreshadowed back in 2016 — before Trump was even sworn in as President:

“I believe that my administration can play a significant role in helping the parties to achieve a just, lasting peace — which must be negotiated between the parties themselves, and not imposed on them by others. Israel and the Jewish people deserve no less”

Trump did not then define who he meant by “the parties”.

Given the developments in the Middle East generally since 2016 - and in Gaza and the West Bank specifically - both Hamas and the PLO seem to have disqualified themselves from possibly participating in negotiating Trump’s peace plan. This leaves the way open for Jordan and Egypt — the last two Arab States to occupy the West Bank and Gaza respectively between 1948 and 1967 — to fill the empty Hamas and PLO chairs at the negotiating table with Israel.

Trump’s new Gaza approach is conditioned upon the following observation made by his three negotiating emissaries — Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt and David Friedman — in their op-ed article in the Washington Post on 20 July:

“For far too long, Gaza has lurched from crisis to crisis, sustained by emergency appeals and one-time caravans of aid, without dealing with the root cause: Hamas leadership is holding the Palestinians of Gaza captive. This problem must be recognized and resolved or we will witness yet another disastrous cycle.”

Hamas is not going to suddenly disappear or allow free and fair elections in Gaza to determine who shall govern Gaza’s population. Any reconciliation by Hamas with the PLO seems most unlikely to occur.

Israel appears to be going along with this Gaza trial balloon being floated by Trump.

Realistically however — ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas will be fatuous unless the following provision in the 1988 Hamas Covenant is shredded:

“The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: it, or any part of it, should not be given up. ...

Trump needs to persuade previously-supportive but now-wavering Arab States to back his peace plan being released without delay.

For Trump to contemplate being dragged into the Hamas and PLO quicksand that has claimed so many sincerely-intentioned do-gooders preceding him is incomprehensible.

Trump should reject PLO and UN propaganda on East Jerusalem

[Published 2 August 2018]

President Trump’s as-yet unannounced “ultimate deal” to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict has received a setback following Saudi Arabia’s King Salman reassuring Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas that Saudi Arabia would oppose any Trump peace plan that did not accept the PLO stance on East Jerusalem becoming the capital of an independent Palestinian Arab state.

The PLO claim to East Jerusalem is based on its own propaganda and that of the United Nations which claims East Jerusalem to be “occupied territory”.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 — adopted on 23 December 2016 - expresses this claim in the following terms:

“1. Reaffirms that the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, has no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-State solution and a just, lasting and comprehensive peace;

2. Reiterates its demand that Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and that it fully respect all of its legal obligations in this regard;”

These clauses are flawed - denying Jewish claims in East Jerusalem and lacking legitimacy for the following reasons:

1. East Jerusalem is not “Palestinian territory”. Jews had lived there for 3000 years until every Jewish inhabitant was forcibly expelled in 1948 by six invading Arab armies.

2. East Jerusalem is “reoccupied territory” — not “occupied territory” — having been reclaimed by the Jewish people in the 1967 Six Day War from Jordanian occupation that had made East Jerusalem Judenrein for 19 years.

3. The legal right to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in East Jerusalem was unanimously affirmed by all 51 member states of the League of Nations under article 6 of the 1922 Mandate for Palestine and preserved by article 80 of the UN Charter.

4. Jews are the only people to have ever had a capital in Jerusalem:

“Jerusalem has stood at the center of the Jewish people’s national and spiritual life since King David made it the capital of his kingdom in 1003 BCE. The city remained the capital of the Davidic dynasty for 400 years, until the kingdom was conquered by the Babylonians. Following the return from the Babylonian exile in 538 BCE, Jerusalem again served as the capital of the Jewish people in its land for the next five and a half centuries.”

5. The Palestinian Arabs failed to establish an independent state with East Jerusalem as its capital between 1948 and 1967 — choosing instead unity with Transjordan to create a new sovereign entity called “Jordan”

6.The PLO on its formation in 1964 expressly rejected any claim to sovereignty in East Jerusalem.

The terms “occupied territory” and “occupied Palestinian territories” have been used to beat Israel over the head for decades. They are false and misleading.

“Reoccupied territory” and “reoccupied Jewish territories” posit an entirely different mindset.

US Ambassador to the United Nations — Nikki Haley — has made Trump’s intentions very clear:

“From now on, every country knows that the United States will not just block anti-Israel measures, we will shine a light on those who are responsible. There won’t be any more free passes for those who bully Israel at the UN”

Trump should reject these fictitious PLO and UN propaganda ploys to remind King Salman of the speciousness of PLO claims to East Jerusalem.

King Salman told Abbas:

“We accept what you accept and we reject what you reject”

Blind submission to PLO dictates is not the way to confront President Trump.

Trump exposes United Nations hypocrisy on PLO, Hamas and Israel

[Published 25 July 2018]

President Trump has challenged United Nations (UN) member States to put their money where their mouths are in a hard hitting speech delivered by US Permanent Representative to the UN - Ambassador Nikki Haley – at a UN Security Council Open Debate on the Middle East on 24 July.

Following Trump’s recent dressing down of NATO – Haley attacked UN member States who are full of words but short on money when it comes to supporting the Palestinian Arabs.

Haley did not mince her words:

"Here at the UN, thousands of miles away from Palestinians who do have real needs, there is no end to the speeches on their behalf. Country after country claims solidarity with the Palestinian people. If those words were useful in the schools, the hospitals, and the streets of their communities, the Palestinian people would not be facing the desperate conditions we are discussing here today. Talk is cheap.

No group of countries is more generous with their words than the Palestinians’ Arab neighbors, and other OIC [Organisation of Islamic Cooperation – ed.] member states. But all of the words spoken here in New York do not feed, clothe, or educate a single Palestinian child. All they do is get the international community riled up."

Haley used members’ contributions to UNRWA to prove her case:

Last year, Iran’s contribution to UNRWA was zero. Algeria’s contribution to UNRWA was zero. Tunisia’s contribution to UNRWA was zero.

Other countries did provide some funding. Pakistan gave $20,000. Egypt gave $20,000. Oman gave $668,000.

Haley did not spare non-Arab and non-Islamic countries from similar naming and shaming:

Other countries talk a big game about the Palestinian cause. In 2017, China provided 350,000 to UNRWA. Russia provided two million dollars to UNWRA.

Haley contrasted America’s generosity:

Last year … the United States gave 364 million dollars… And that’s on top of what the American people give annually to the Palestinians in bilateral assistance. That is another 300 million dollars just last year, and it averages to more than a quarter of a billion dollars every year since 1993.

Haley delivered this stern warning:

“But we are not fools. If we extend a hand in friendship and generosity, we do not expect our hand to be bitten. And as we extend our hand, we also expect others to extend their hands as well.”

Haley emphasised that Arab countries’ giving more money was not the only issue confronting them:

Too often, the Arab countries give just enough money and mouth just enough uncompromising words to stay out of the crosshairs of Palestinian representatives. But if they really cared about the Palestinian people, they would not do that. Instead, they would condemn extremism and they would put forth serious ideas for compromises that could end this struggle and lead to a better life for the Palestinian people. They would tell the Palestinian leadership how foolish they look for condemning a peace proposal [Trumps’ “ultimate deal” – ed.] they haven’t even seen yet.

Haley called out both the PLO and Hamas:

The Palestinian leadership has been allowed to live a false reality for too long because Arab leaders are afraid to tell them the truth… It is time for the regional states in particular to step up and really help the Palestinian people, instead of just making speeches thousands of miles away.

Those regional States - Egypt, Jordan Syria and Lebanon – can help by sitting down with Israel and negotiating an end to the 100-years old Arab-Jewish conflict as prescribed 51 years ago by UN Security Council Resolution 242.

Delivering this message to the UN has been long overdue.

Trump and Putin focus on Syria-Israel, Arab-Jewish conflicts

[Published 19 July 2018]

Defusing the Syria–Israel conflict and resurrecting the primacy of Security Council Resolution 242 in resolving the Arab-Jewish conflict have emerged as positive outcomes from the Trump-Putin summit in Helsinki this week.

President Putin expressed America and Russia’s joint resolve with this succinct statement:

“The south of Syria should be brought to the full compliance with the treaty of 1974 about the separation of forces, about separation of forces of Israel and Syria. This will bring peace to Golan Heights. And bring more peaceful relationship between Syria and Israel and also to provide security of the state of Israel. Mr. President paid special attention to the issue during today’s negotiations. I would like to confirm that Russia is interested in this development and this will act accordingly. Thus far, we will make a step toward creating a lasting peace in compliance with the respective resolutions of security council, for instance the resolution 338.”

Article 1 of the 1974 Syria-Israel Separation of Forces Agreement provides:

“Israel and Syria will scrupulously observe the cease-fire on land, sea and air and will refrain from all military actions against each other, from the time of the signing of the document, in implementation of United Nations Security Council resolution 338 dated October 22, 1973.”

Security Council Resolution 338 - adopted following the 1973 Yom Kippur War:

“Calls upon all parties concerned to start immediately after the cease-fire the implementation of Security Council Resolution 242 (1967) in all of its parts";

Article 1 of Security Council Resolution 242 - adopted following the 1967 Six Day War:

“Affirms that the fulfilment of Charter principles requires the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East which should include the application of both the following principles:
(i) Withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;
(ii) Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force;”

When Security Council Resolution 242 was passed on 22 November 1967:

1. The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) was not the sole spokesman for the Palestinian Arabs - having only being so appointed at the 7th Arab League Summit held in Rabat in October 1974.

2. Arabs living in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) (“Territories”) were Jordanian citizens and possessed Jordanian passports following these Territories being unified with Transjordan on 24 April 1950 and subsequently being renamed Jordan.

3. The PLO was expressly not claiming territorial sovereignty in the Territories or Gaza - article 24 of the PLO Charter proclaiming:

“This Organization does not exercise any regional sovereignty over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, on the Gaza Strip or the Himmah Area. Its activities will be on the national popular level in the liberational, organizational, political and financial fields.

4. No additional Arab State in former Palestine – in addition to Jordan – was contemplated.

5. Hamas had not been founded.

Resolution 242 still contains the only internationally agreed formula for peacefully ending the 100 years old Arab-Jewish conflict.

A conference to resolve this long-running conflict in accordance with Resolution 242 - co-chaired by America and Russia – would see Israel and every Arab State in the area attending but would exclude non-States PLO and Hamas. Such a conference now looms as a possible Trump-Putin initiative - putting Trump’s unannounced “ultimate deal” on the backburner.

Going back to 1967 could indeed be the key to resolving the 100 years old Arab-Jewish conflict.

PLO-Hamas anti-England, anti-Israel hatred politicises FIFA World Cup.

[Published 11 July 2018]

Hatred against Britain and Israel surfaced in Gaza as England progressed its way through the World Cup to meet Sweden in the quarter finals.

One Gaza fan was outspoken:

“Of course I will support Sweden.

I can’t imagine a Palestinian supporting England, which created the Balfour Declaration, or not supporting the country that stood before the world and recognized our state."

The 1917 Balfour Declaration has never been forgotten or forgiven by the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Hamas — both of whom consider the Declaration to be null and void — spending decades in spruiking this false message to their respective constituencies — fomenting Arab hatred against the Jews since the Declaration first called for the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.

The fuming Gaza fan was expressing his resentment by barracking for Sweden — even though Sweden was one of the 51 countries that transformed the Balfour Declaration into binding international law by unanimously incorporating it in the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine in 1922.

Our anguished fan was blissfully unaware of these facts having obviously not studied the 100 years old Arab-Jewish conflict. Anti-England prejudice was enough to back his decision to go for Sweden.

True — Sweden had purged itself of its 1922 decision when officially recognizing the State of Palestine in October 2014 - making it the first major European Union member state to back the PLO’s statehood bid.

However in atoning for its 1922 sin - Sweden’s recognition of the “State of Palestine” was a fiction that failed to meet the requirements demanded in international law by Article 1 of the 1933 Montevideo Convention which states:

“The state as a person of international law should possess the following qualifications:
(i) A permanent population
(ii) defined territory
(iii) Government
(iv) Capacity to enter into relations with the other states"

FIFA’s admission of the Palestinian Football Federation as a member of FIFA in 1988 had also contravened Article 10.1 of FIFA’s then governing articles:

“Any Association which is responsible for organising and supervising football in its country may become a Member of FIFA. In this context, the expression “country” shall refer to an independent state recognised by the international Community.”

FIFA started living in its own dream world 26 years before Sweden joined it.

Who will replace Sweden as Britain’s nemesis was summed up by another fan:

“Anyone supporting England is supporting Israel itself. These teams represent their countries and governments and will raise their flags in the stands. How can I support the country that allowed the Jewish state on our land?”

The Gazan fans are in for a shock and a reality check when they begin choosing one of the three remaining teams — France, Belgium or Croatia - to topple the evil Brits.

France, Belgium and Croatia just happen to have all voted in favour of the Mandate for Palestine incorporating the Balfour Declaration.

The semi-finals, final and third-place playoff will be agony for Gazan viewers as one of these last four countries holds up the trophy on the winner’s podium come finals day - the others the three minor places - with their flags filling Gaza’s TV screens.

The moral is clear — international law cannot be turned on and off as circumstances dictate — because one day the perpetrator will become entrapped in the hopeless position that the Arab States, the PLO and Hamas now find themselves.

Throwing out binding international law — the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate for Palestine — and falsely creating fake international law — “the State of Palestine” — goes to the heart of why the Arab-Jewish conflict still remains unresolved in 2018.

PLO and Hamas perpetuate apartheid in West Bank and Gaza

[Published 6 July 2018]

The British Foreign Office showed appalling judgment when scheduling a visit by Prince William to a refugee camp in the West Bank which should have been closed down long ago.

The Prince - obviously moved by what he saw - remarked:

“I saw at Jalazon (refugee camp) the tremendous hardships faced by the refugees, and I can only imagine the difficulties of life lived under these conditions, the ed (sic) resources and the lack of opportunity,”

Regrettably Prince William failed to question why:

1. Jalazon had not been dismantled during the past 25 years after it came under Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) control.

2. Jalazon’s inhabitants should still be classified as “refugees” when they are living in part of former Palestine now under PLO occupation.

Prince William’s visit was closely followed by a meeting between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and United Nations (UN) Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process - Nickolay Mladenov. During their meeting - Abbas stressed the UN’s important role in providing protection for the “Palestinian people” and the necessity of continuing to provide services to the “Palestinian refugees” through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).

Undiscussed between them was why the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza have failed to close down the 27 refugee camps still remaining within their respective fiefdoms.

The West Bank currently has 775,000 registered “refugees” - around a quarter of who live in 19 refugee camps. Most of the others live in West Bank towns and villages. Some camps are located next to major towns and others are in rural areas. UNRWA provides services in these 19 Palestine refugee camps - but does not administer or police the camps - as this is the responsibility of the PLO — intriguingly identified as the “host authority” by UNRWA

Gaza has 1.3 million registered “refugees” - of who 500000 currently live in 8 refugee camps. As in the West Bank - UNRWA does not administer or police these camps -this being the responsibility of the “host authority” - Hamas.

The West Bank refugee camps are all located within Areas “A” and “B” — some 40% of the territory of the West Bank - being under full PLO administrative control as designated by the Oslo Accords. 95% of the West Bank Arab population - including all those living in the refugee camps — live in Areas “A” and “B”

Many of these camps and their inhabitants date back to 1949. Severe overcrowding problems, high rates of unemployment, personal safety and poor infrastructure are common to them all.

Gaza’s entire population has been under Hamas occupation since 2007.

The PLO and Hamas have maintained their discriminatory two-tiered refugee segregation systems in Gaza and the West Bank for at least the last ten years under which:

1. 800000 “refugees” live in refugee camps

2. 1,570,000 “refugees” live among the general population

Closing these refugee camps and integrating their long-suffering populations among the general population are long overdue. The failure of the PLO and Hamas to do so allows them to maintain and exploit a hard core of hate-filled and desperate Palestinian Arabs who can be readily incited and used as pawns and martyrs to undertake acts of terrorism against Israel.

UN and UNRWA complicity in refusing to pressure the PLO and Hamas to close these squalid camps and end an ever-worsening humanitarian crisis is reprehensible, immoral and completely inexcusable.

Perpetuating apartheid by segregation and discrimination whilst denying equal rights to all members of the Arab populations in the West Bank and Gaza spells disaster for both the PLO and Hamas.

False narrative haunts PLO and UN as Trump courts Arab States.

[Published 28 June 2018]

Nabil Abu Rudeineh - spokesman for Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas — has angrily reacted to President Trump’s intensive diplomatic efforts seeking to enlist Egypt, Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia in advancing Trump’s long-awaited “deal of the century” to end the Arab-Jewish conflict.

Rudeineh fulminated:

“The American delegation should abandon the illusion that creating false facts and falsifying history are going to help it sell those illusions.”

Creating false facts and falsifying history has been the province of the PLO and the United Nations (UN) for decades.

The 1968 PLO Charter declared the 1917 Balfour Declaration, the 1922 Mandate for Palestine and everything subsequently based on them to be null and void.

The United Nations publication “The Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem 1917-1988” (“Study”) - published by the Division for Palestinian Rights of the United Nations Secretariat for, and under the guidance of, the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People - falsely claimed:

“After investigating various alternatives the United Nations proposed the partitioning of Palestine into two independent States, one Palestinian Arab and the other Jewish…”

The UN proposal—Resolution 181(II) - actually referred to:

“Independent Arab and Jewish States”...

Resolution 181(II) clearly denied the existence of any distinctly identifiable Palestinian people in 1947 — yet the Study falsified this narrative.

The Study also omitted to mention that 78% of Palestine had already become an independent Arab State in 1946 and been renamed the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan.

Creating a separate state for the “Palestinians” - never identified as a separate people by the international community in 1947 — is seen by that same international community in 2018 to be the only solution capable of ending the conflict between Jews and Arabs.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Two peoples — the Jews and the Arabs — already have their own independent States in former Palestine - named Israel and Jordan.

Rudeineh continued:

“Despite the burden of regional issues, there are things that cannot be weighed with gold and humanitarian aid, or solutions that try to cut from a more than 100-year-old historical conflict.”

This is the first time the PLO has ever acknowledged that the Jewish-Arab conflict originated in the events following the Balfour Declaration in 1917 — not the events following the 1948 Arab-Israel War.

UN Secretary-General Guterres helped perpetuate this falsehood when recently referring to the “Israeli/Palestinian conflict”.

There were no “Israelis” or “Palestinians” 95 years ago when the preamble to the Mandate for Palestine declared:

“Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted by the said Powers, in favor of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine , or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country; “

British reversal of this policy in 1922 saw Transjordan — today called Jordan — totally closed to Jewish settlement to prevent the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home there. The 1937 Peel Commission counted for nothing.

Forty crucial years in Palestine’s history until 1948 were shredded by the PLO and materially altered by the UN Study in propagating the “Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People”.

Rudeineh’s statements mark a welcome return to reality.

Getting other Arab interlocutors to replace the PLO in negotiations with Israel remains Trump’s crucial starting point to ending the Arab-Jewish conflict.

Jordan baulks at replacing PLO in negotiations with Israel

[Published 21 June 2018]

President Trump’s long-awaited plan on ending the Arab-Israeli conflict will be further delayed following a flurry of diplomatic activity over the past week.

Critical to the success of Trump’s plan will involve replacing the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as Israel’s negotiating partner over the last 25 years. The PLO has cut its own throat by making it very clear it will have nothing to do with anything Trump proposes.

Trump’s Senior Advisor Jared Kushner and Special Representative for International Negotiations Jason Greenblatt met in New York City on 15 June with United States Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The White House reported they had a productive discussion about the efforts of the United States to promote peace in the Middle East and to meet humanitarian needs in Gaza.

This UN visit was followed by Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flying to Amman for a public meeting with Jordan’s King Abdullah on June 18 — their first since 2014. Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, General Intelligence Department Director Maj. Gen. Adnan Jundi, Adviser to His Majesty and Director of the Office of His Majesty Manar Dabbas and Adviser to His Majesty for Economic Affairs Mohamad Al Ississ attended the meeting.

Communiques separately issued by Netanyahu and Abdullah following their meeting differ significantly.

Netanyahu’s communique was very brief stating they had discussed:

“regional developments and advancing the peace process, and bilateral relations. Prime Minister Netanyahu reiterated Israel’s commitment to maintaining the status quo at the holy sites in Jerusalem”

Abdullah’s communique was far more expansive and revealing:

“His Majesty King Abdullah, at a meeting on Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who departed Jordan after a short visit, stressed the need to make progress in efforts to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict on the basis of the two-state solution and in accordance with international law, relevant UN resolutions, and the Arab Peace Initiative.

King Abdullah reaffirmed that the only way to achieve peace and stability in the region is by reaching a two-state solution and the establishment of a Palestinian state on the 4 June 1967 lines with East Jerusalem as its capital, living side by side with Israel in peace and security.”

Abdullah was mouthing the mantra articulated by the PLO over the last 25 years during unsuccessful negotiations with Israel. Trump has little chance of seeing his own “ultimate deal“ come to fruition if Jordan replaces the PLO propagating this same failed objective.

Abdullah’s communique continued:

“The King affirmed that Jordan will continue upholding its historical role in safeguarding Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem, in accordance with the Hashemite Custodianship.”

The Washington Declaration signed by Israel and Jordan on 25 July 1994 respected:

“the present role of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in the Muslim Holy Shrines in Jerusalem. When negotiations on the permanent status will take place, Israel will give high priority to the Jordanian historic role in these shrines.”

Extending Jordan’s custodianship to the Christian holy sites is presumptuous of Abdullah and flies in the face of the Washington Declaration.

Kushner and Greenblatt met Abdullah on 19 June — when the King stood his ground repeating almost verbatim the above statements made to Netanyahu just the day before.

Trump — the consummate deal maker - will probably delay releasing his plan until Abdullah agrees to negotiate with Israel on recovering land lost in the 1967 Six Day War by Jordan to Israel in Judea and Samaria (West Bank)

Abdullah would be a brave man continuing to defy Trump - as the PLO has already discovered to its chagrin.

PLO rejects Trump lifeline on negotiations with Israel

[Published 14 June 2018]

President Trump — still mulling over the release of his ultimate peace deal to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict - has seen the swift rejection of the call by Jason D. Greenblatt — Trump’s Special Representative for International Negotiations - to have Dr Saeb Erekat replaced as chief negotiator for the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) in future negotiations with Israel.

Greenblatt raised America’s objection to Erekat in stark and uncompromising terms — alleging Erekat:

1. failed to contribute to an atmosphere conducive to peace

2. used rhetoric and made claims that were in many respects simply inaccurate

3. had baselessly claimed that Trump’s decision to move the American Embassy to Jerusalem was part of a U.S. attempt to force an Israeli-written agreement on the Palestinians.

4. had failed to acknowledge a significant escalation of rockets fired by Hamas and other militant groups into Israel, which clearly represented the danger that Hamas and these groups present.

Greenblatt asserted that the Palestinian leadership need not shackle themselves to Hamas’ failure — in fact, this should be the Palestinian Authority’s opportunity to do the right thing for the people they lead.

Greenblatt called on Erekat and the Palestinian Authority to reject Hamas’ violence and lies and work with America to bring relief to Gaza where America believed real progress could be made that would lay the foundation for a more hopeful future.

Greenblatt’s reference to the “Palestinian Authority” was strange indeed - since it had been disbanded by written decree issued by PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on 3 January 2013.

Greenblatt stressed it was time to stop indulging in overwrought rhetoric and give the Palestinian people something beyond words. Palestinian leadership must create better lives, not sacrifice those lives for Hamas’ grim agenda of terror.

Greenblatt claimed he had heard many Palestinian voices over the past 16 months and many did not agree with Erekat or his approach. Yet, the sad thing is that most would only meet and speak honestly and openly in private because they are afraid to speak publicly.

Greenblatt summed up:

“Dr. Erekat — we have heard your voice for decades and it has not achieved anything close to Palestinian aspirations or anything close to a comprehensive peace agreement. Other Palestinian perspectives might help us finally achieve a comprehensive peace agreement where Palestinian and Israeli lives can be better.

The time for leadership and responsibility is now. The time for meeting after meeting of government officials repeating the same talking points is over. The Palestinian people want real action, and they need honest, realistic and decisive solutions.

The notion that Israel is going away — or that Jerusalem is not its capital — is a mirage. The notion that the United States is not the critical interlocutor for the peace process is a mirage.”

In a stinging, vitriolic reply Erekat immediately responded:

“In dozens of meetings we had with Mr. Greenblatt he refused to discuss substance: no borders, no settlements, and no two-state solution. Today, his role is nothing less than peddling Israeli policies to a skeptical international community, and then becomes upset when he’s reminded of this.”

Erekat will remain in his decades-long position unless pulmonary fibrosis prevents him physically discharging his current role. Erekat’s replacement would undoubtedly continue the same failed tactics adopted by Erekat.

Erekat’s predictable response should be seen as yet one more reason justifying Trump’s emerging strategy to replace the PLO with Jordan, Egypt and possibly Saudi Arabia in negotiations with Israel on the future of Gaza, Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and East Jerusalem.

Rejecting Trump’s proffered lifeline ensures the PLO will play no part in future negotiations on Trump’s ultimate deal.

Israel condemns PLO lies as Trump contemplates PLO demise

[Published 21 May 2018]

The historic opening of the American Embassy in Jerusalem has provided opportunities for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to totally discredit the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and President Trump to review the PLO as a suitable Arab interlocutor to negotiate with Israel on ending the Jewish-Arab conflict.

Addressing the large gathering of American dignitaries and Israeli public figures – Netanyahu declared:

“The truth and peace are interconnected. A peace that is built on lies will crash on the rocks of Middle Eastern reality. You can only build peace on truth, and the truth is that Jerusalem has been and will always be the capital of the Jewish people, the capital of the Jewish state”

PLO Chairman – Mahmoud Abbas - didn’t take very long to reply with an outburst against America that seriously questions the fitness of the PLO to resume negotiations with Israel since the PLO walk-out in April 2014:

“What we saw in Jerusalem today was not the opening of an embassy, but the opening of an American settlement outpost. Before we had settlement outposts with American help, but today we have an American settlement outpost in East Jerusalem.”

The rift between Trump and Abbas just continues to widen.

Not content with this salvo – Abbas claimed that the United States:

“has removed itself from the political work in the Middle East as a mediator. It’s no longer an arbiter,”

President Trump would not take kindly to this latest rejection by the PLO of America’s decades-old role as sole mediator in any negotiations aimed at resolving a dispute that has gone on for 100 years.

For Israel – it was just the latest shot in a litany of lies that had its genesis in the 1964 Charter of the PLO - subsequently revised in 1968 – which still remain unamended despite false claims to the contrary.

The 1964 Charter had stated in Article 24:

“This Organization does not exercise any regional sovereignty over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, on the Gaza Strip or the Himmah Area. Its activities will be on the national popular level in the liberational, organizational, political and financial fields.”

Yet the 1968 Charter deleted this clause after Jordan and Egypt’s 19 years-occupation of these territories was ended in 1967.

The PLO had suddenly discovered an inalienable right to regional sovereignty in every square meter of these areas. Amazingly this claim has been swallowed hook line and sinker by the United Nations.

Such a recent claim is certainly novel and now must be weighed against Israel’s claim - whose roots in these territories were established 3000 years ago and can be visibly verified in 2018.

The biggest PLO lies are contained in Article 20 of the 1968 Charter:

“The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.”

These lies have driven the PLO campaign to wipe Israel off the face of the map rather than negotiate a division of former Palestine where sovereignty in 78% is already vested in Jordan and 17% in Israel - the last 5% still remaining unallocated between Arabs and Jews

These PLO lies should have been shredded decades ago. They have proved to be the greatest obstacle to peace between Israel and the PLO.

Macron, Merkel and May should adopt Trump Policy on Jerusalem

[Published 13 May 2018]

The opening of the American Embassy on 14 May in Israel’s capital — Jerusalem — should be replicated by fellow-democracies France, Germany and The United Kingdom (“the Democratic Trio”) without delay.

President Trump’s policy on Jerusalem was set out by him on 6 December 2017 (“the Trump Declaration”):

“STATUS OF JERUSALEM: President Trump recognizes that specific boundaries of sovereignty in Jerusalem is highly sensitive and subject to final status negotiations.

President Trump recognizes that the status of Jerusalem is a highly-sensitive issue, but he does not think the peace process is aided by ignoring the simple truth that Jerusalem is home to Israel’s legislature, supreme court, President, and Prime Minister.

President Trump recognizes that the specific boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem are subject to final status negotiations between the parties.

President Trump reaffirms United States support for the status quo at the Temple Mount, also known as Haram al Sharif.”

This policy should be perfectly acceptable to the Democratic Trio — yet they have so far baulked at following Trump’s principled stance.

French President Emmanuel Macron has adopted the following position:

“The status of Jerusalem is a question of international security that concerns the entire international community. The status of Jerusalem must be determined by Israelis and Palestinians in the framework of negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations,”

Waiting for these stars to align is like hoping to win the lottery.The Trump Declaration provides sufficient guarantees to ensure that should Macron’s wish-list ever eventuate - the United Nations will be sufficiently seized of the situation to ensure the status of Jerusalem is finally determined between Arabs and Jews.

Refusing to move the French Embassy to Israel’s designated capital now - whilst negotiations to determine Jerusalem’s future have been suspended by the Palestine Liberation Organization since April 2014 - is bowing to the dictates and diplomatic blackmail of an illegal and undemocratic entity.

France — a bastion of democracy — is being incredibly naïve in not following in the footsteps of the Trump Declaration.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has issued a public statement assuring Germany will not relocate its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem:

“We have to work for the two-state solution, and according to that, the status of Jerusalem should be clarified.”

The “two-state solution” has been the subject of unsuccessful negotiations for the last 25 years.

East Jerusalem was never suggested or declared as the capital of Jordan or another independent Arab state during the years between 1948 and 1967 when East Jerusalem was:

1. illegally occupied by Jordan

2. all Jews living there were forcibly expelled from their homes

3. centuries-old Synagogues and Jewish cemeteries were desecrated and destroyed

4.Jews were denied access to their remaining holy sites

Merkel needs to reject this dark period in Jerusalem’s history by adopting the reality expressed in the Trump Declaration.

Britain’s prime minister Theresa May has stated:

“We disagree with the US decision to move its embassy to Jerusalem and recognize Jerusalem as the Israeli capital before a final status agreement. The British Embassy to Israel is based in Tel Aviv, and we have no plans to move”

Moving the United Kingdom’s Embassy to West Jerusalem on the identical basis enunciated by Trump will not prejudice future negotiations between Jews and Arabs to resolve East Jerusalem’s final status.

France, Germany and the United Kingdom need to get on the Trump bandwagon and move their Embassies to Israel’s declared capital — Jerusalem — following their own worldwide well-established diplomatic practices and precedents.

Disagreements between democracies play into the hands of unelected and unaccountable regimes.Bowing to these regimes’ unjust and unreasonable demands is a sure-fire recipe for disaster.

PLO dumps Trump easing way for Jordan-Israel negotiations

[Published 6 May 2018]

President Trump’s soon-to-released proposal on resolving the Jewish-Arab conflict will be more readily achievable following the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) confirming it will not participate in implementing Trump’s peace plans.

Secretary General of the PLO Executive Committee Saeb Erekat led the charge:

“No one will deceive us and we will not fall into the illusion that the United States can have any balanced ideas that could lead to the achievement of a real and just peace. Washington has become part of the problem and not the solution”

PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas backed-up Erekat a few days later — censuring Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and stating Palestinians believe the US can no longer be the sole mediator in the decades-long conflict with Israel due to America’s pro-Tel Aviv bias.

Abbas declared Trump’s plan would be:

“an end to the peace process in the Middle East.”

Erekat and Abbas’s acts of political hara-kiri coincided with Trump’s newly-appointed Secretary of State - Mike Pompeo - visiting Jordan

Jordanian Foreign Minister — Ayman Safadi — welcomed Pompeo with the decades-old Arab mantra:

”[The Palestinian -Israeli conflict] is, we believe, the main cause of instability in the region, and its resolution is the key to achieving the lasting and comprehensive peace that we want. The two-state solution remains the only path to that peace, as we believe in Jordan, and it is the solution that would allow for the emergence of an independent, sovereign Palestine state with East Jerusalem as its capital in the lines of June 4, 1967.

Yes, that the two-state solution is being challenged. Yes, there are many obstacles. But I think what is — what is the alternative? We cannot give up in our efforts to achieve peace, nor can we say that there is any viable alternative that we can sustain.”

Pompeo begged to disagree:

” We’re certainly open to a two-party solution. That’s a likely outcome.”

Another likely outcome will doubtless be revealed in Trump’s proposal.

Pompeo deferred answering whether the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was the most serious threat to stability in the region. He would have been derided had he agreed —given the conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon and Libya.

On Trump’s "ultimate deal" — Pompeo asserted:

“We understand that ultimately this deal will be agreed to between the Israelis and the Palestinians, but certainly it’s the case that as America continues to be involved in facilitating such an arrangement, we’re doing so in close alignment with Jordan and the Jordanian people so that we’re working together ...”

Any PLO refusal to agree to the deal will receive the Trump treatment meted out to Trump-defiers - reduced funding and diplomatic downgrading. Jordan - working in close alignment with Trump - will reap substantial dividends.

Pompeo referred to the five-year Memorandum of Understanding signed by the United States and Jordan in February committing the US to provide over $6.3 billion in bilateral foreign assistance to Jordan over the next five years — a powerful incentive for Jordan to help Trump bring his proposals to fruition.

Pompeo — significantly — provided two additional substantial sweeteners:

“We’ll continue to work with Jordan to help the Kingdom defend its borders, always.”

Pompeo was signaling that any PLO attempt to overthrow 95 years of unbroken Hashemite rule in Jordan — unsuccessfully attempted by the PLO in September 1970 — would be rebuffed by American military force.

Protecting the Hashemite regime and Jordan’s borders — coupled with massive injections of American financial aid — could see Jordan replacing the PLO as Israel’s Arab partner in implementing Trump’s peace proposals.

Trump — the master deal-maker - may have just pulled another rabbit out of his magic hat.

Trump unscrambles UN-EU-PLO misinformation omelette

[Published 29 April 2018]

President Trump has started unscrambling the misinformation omelette first cooked up by the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) Charter in 1964 and dished out by the United Nations (UN) and European Union (EU) since 1974.

Trump’s intention was revealed when the State Department released its annual “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2017” (“Report”)- renaming its segment previously entitled “Israel and The Occupied Territories” with a new descriptor – “Israel, Golan Heights, West Bank, and Gaza”.

Israel and the Golan Heights are dealt with together in one section of the Report – whilst the West Bank and Gaza are covered in another.

Commas count big time in Middle East diplomacy.

One comma strategically placed in the descriptor - “… West Bank, and Gaza” – identifies them as two separate territorial entities that could involve different solutions.

The Report’s new choice of language signals that resolving the Arab-Jewish conflict extends beyond the West Bank and Gaza to also include the Golan Heights and that any end to the conflict will only eventuate with the allocation of sovereignty in all three of these disputed areas.

This ground-breaking replacement of false statements with factual reality needs to be replicated by Trump in other areas of misinformation maliciously spread by the UN, EU and PLO – including:

1. Recognition that the term “West Bank” was first used in 1950 and that for 3000 years prior thereto that territory had been called “Judea and Samaria”

2. Acknowledgement that the “Palestinian Authority” created by the 1993 Oslo Accords was disbanded by written decree of PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on 3 January 2013.

3. Affirmation of the right of the Jewish People to close settlement on land in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in Palestine under the rights vested in them by article 6 of the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine (the 1922 Mandate) – as preserved by article 80 of the United Nations Charter.

4. Ending the fiction that the territory of former Palestine stopped at the Jordan River and agreeing that it included the Hashemite Kingdom of TransJordan – 78% of the territory comprised in the 1922 Mandate - which was granted independence by Great Britain in 1946 and subsequently renamed Jordan in 1950.

5. Confirming that most of the Golan Heights was included within the 1922 Mandate until Britain ceded the area to France in the Franco-British Agreement of 7 March 1923

6. Rebranding the UN and EU designated “Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT)” as “The Disputed Territories”

7. Agreement that Security Council Resolution 242 does not require Israel’s total withdrawal from Judea and Samaria (West Bank).

Cracking heads by getting all interested parties to adopt an agreed narrative using terms with agreed meanings is crucial in any communications and negotiations between them - if Trump’s long-awaited “ultimate deal” is to not be still born.

Underestimating Trump’s ability to win the Presidential election race against Hillary Clinton in 2016 has seen those who confidently predicted his defeat subsequently engaged in a vitriolic war of attrition in the media trying to convince the electorate that they voted for the wrong candidate.

Yet Trump continues to confound his detractors with impressive gains in both the American economy and foreign affairs.

The State Department Report – in dumping the use of the nomenclature “The Occupied Territories” – has taken one giant step towards ending the decades-long dishonest semantic warfare waged by the PLO, UN and EU.

Trump has set himself a Herculean task confronting this sorry state of affairs.

Trump has once again dumbfounded his malevolent doomsday-pundits – whisking up an omelette that already promises to taste far better than any ever served up by the PLO, UN and EU.

Arab Summit helps Trump break Jordan-PLO-Israel impasse

[Published 22 April 2018]

The 29th Arab Summit - concluded in Dhahran on 15 April - has presented President Trump with a wonderful opportunity to circumvent the Palestine Liberation Organisation’s (PLO) refusal to consider Trump’s eagerly-awaited proposals to end the Arab-Jewish conflict.

Conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Bahrain and Sudan received scant attention - the Summit’s final communique declaring::

“We reaffirm that the Palestine Cause is the entire Arab nation’s main priority, stressing the Arab identity of occupied East Al-Quds as the capital of the State of Palestine.”

Using the term “Palestine Cause” rather than “Palestinian cause” indicates the Arab world now intends focusing on recovering territory lost in the 1967 Six Day War without necessarily creating another Palestinian Arab state – in addition to Jordan - in former Palestine.

The communique further reinforced this interpretation when adding:

“The conflict could be ended through a two-state solution that guarantees the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the borders of 4 July 1967 with East Al-Quds as its capital.”

Using the words “could be ended” rather than “can only be ended” is highly significant in the context of this long-running conflict where every word uttered is invariably scrutinised and analysed in great detail.

The Summit’s declared “two-state solution” - pressed for the last 25 years by the PLO and the Arab League and endorsed by the United Nations and the European Union as the only solution to end the Arab-Jewish conflict – is now being seen by the Arab world as just one possible solution.

The Dhahran Communique downgraded the PLO’s sole-spokesman status:

“We consider the Jordanian authorities as the only body in charge of the administration, maintenance and access to Al-Aqsa Mosque”.

This unequivocal Arab endorsement of Jordan challenges the PLO having any future control or influence in the most sensitive area of crucial concern to the Islamic world in Jerusalem - the Moslem holy sites.

Jordan has maintained its presence in Jerusalem as Islamic Holy Shrines Custodian for the last 24 years as a result of the 1994 Peace Agreement between Jordan and Israel – article 9 declaring:

"1.​ Each Party will provide freedom of access to places of religious and historical significance"
2.​ In this regard, in accordance with the Washington Declaration, Israel respects the present special role of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in Muslim Holy shrines in Jerusalem. When negotiations on the permanent status will take place, Israel will give high priority to the Jordanian historic role in these shrines.
3.​ The Parties will act together to promote interfaith relations among the three monotheistic religions, with the aim of working towards religious understanding, moral commitment, freedom of religious worship, and tolerance and peace.”

The Washington Declaration - signed by His Majesty King Hussein and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin at the White House on July 25, 1994 in the presence of President Clinton - formally ended the 46-year state of war between Jordan and Israel.

The Washington Declaration is testament to America’s role as the only power possessing the prestige and clout to change Arab and Jewish perceptions on resolving their long-running conflict.

Jordan’s special role in Jerusalem recognised by the Summit closely follows PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s recent assertion that Jordanians and Palestinians are indeed one people.

Resolving the “Palestine Cause” remains more easily achievable in negotiations between Israel and Jordan within the framework of their existing peace treaty - rather than resuming fruitless negotiations pursued over the last 25 years between Israel and the PLO.

Ending the 100 years old “Palestine Curse” which has so terribly afflicted both Jews and Arabs could well be within Trump’s grasp thanks to the Dhahran Summit.

Trump pressure pushes Jordan to choose Israel or PLO

[Published 15 April 2018]

The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) — refusing to bow to pressure by President Trump to cease payments to terrorists and their families currently exceeding US$400 million annually — is looming as a potential threat to end 96 years of unbroken Hashemite rule in Jordan.

PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas - addressing the ninth annual Islamic Beit al-Maqdes International Conference in Ramallah last week — has sent a veiled message of the PLO’s intention to challenge Jordan’s ruling Hashemite family if PLO demands for a State in the West Bank with Jerusalem as its capital are not met.

Jordan comprised almost 77% of Palestine between 1920 and 1946 until granted independence by Great Britain and being renamed The Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan — subsequently being renamed Jordan in 1950 following Transjordan’s illegal annexation of Judea and Samaria in 1948 (redesignated the West Bank).

This semantic sleight of hand could never change the historic and demographic reality that Jordan formed part of the territory comprised in the 1922 Mandate for Palestine — Jordan’s Crown Prince Hassan declaring in the Foreign Affairs Review in 1982:

“the Jordanians and Palestinians are now one people, and no political loyalty, however strong, will separate them permanently.”

Abbas told the Ramallah Conference:

“In Palestine and Jordan, we are one people in two states and we will never accept an alternative homeland.”

Abbas’s statement mirrored PLO founder Yasser Arafat’s in Der Spiegel in 1986:

“Jordanians and Palestinians are indeed one people. No one can divide us. We have the same fate.”

Farouk Kadoumi - the Head of the Political Department of the PLO - told Newsweek on 14 March 1977:

“Jordanians and Palestinians are considered by the PLO as one people.”

Alleging flagrant bias towards Israel by the Trump Administration — Abbas defiantly declared:

“We are not expecting anything from them. We won’t accept anything from them.”

Abbas is being incredibly naïve if he believes he can now convince the international community into accepting that one people needs two states — and that pursuing that goal should be internationally supported at the expense of achieving an end to a conflict that originated with the 1917 Balfour Declaration.

Abbas’s categorical rejection of an American role in ending the conflict by calling on the international community to help create a second Arab state in former Palestine — in addition to Jordan—has little chance of success.

Jordan’s King Abdullah should by now be under no illusion that the PLO’s quest to create a PLO-ruled State is doomed to failure. Abdullah should view with apprehension that Abbas’s remarks at the Ramallah Conference could again be laying the groundwork for another PLO attempt to overthrow Hashemite rule in Jordan — as unsuccessfully occurred in September 1970 and is prescribed by article 2 of the PLO Charter.

The solution proposed by Israel’s late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in The Australian on 27 May 1985 now takes on added significance:

“the Palestinians should have a sovereign State which includes most of the Palestinians. It should be Jordan with a considerable part of the West Bank and Gaza. East of the Jordan River there is enough room to settle the Palestinian refugees”

Such a solution - negotiated between Israel and Jordan under the framework of their 1994 Peace Treaty — would see continuing Hashemite rule in Jordan being backed by Israel and America - stability sadly lacking presently in many failed Arab States such as Syria and Libya.

Abbas’s Ramallah statement has presented Jordan with a stark choice - negotiate with Israel or continue supporting the PLO and face the prospect of another attempt to overthrow Jordan’s ruling Hashemite dynasty.

Jordan’s decision should be a no-brainer.