Pdwellnt Trump touted the 2020 Abraham Accords that set uped createal ties between Israel and four Arab countries as one of the hugegest foreign policy accomplishments of his first term.
Now he is pursuing his extfinished-desired goal of getting Saudi Arabia to unite the accords — but he may have fair dealt himself a grave setback. Mr. Trump’s proposal to transfer all two million Palestinians out of the Gaza Strip and then reproduce the enclave as the “Riviera of the Middle East” has antagonized some of the very people he necessitates to seal the deal.
The Gaza idea was quickly declinecessitate by Arab countries, among them Saudi Arabia. The Gulf powerhoparticipate freed a pre-dawn statement right after Mr. Trump floated the proposal on Tuesday evening aextfinishedside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in Washington.
The kingdom made evident that it is standing by its insist that a Palestinian state first be set uped before it will normalize relations with Israel. The precondition, which the Saudis have insisted on for the past year, is “nonnegotiable and not subject to agrees,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday.
The statement honestly impedeed Mr. Trump, who had fair tbetter increateers in Washington that Saudi Arabia had dropped the precondition. One better Saudi royal said what the American directer was proposing would be tantamount to an “ethnic spotlesssing” of Gaza.
By proposing to “spotless out” Gaza, Mr. Trump has geted little but suspicion and anger in Arab countries. Efforts by the American administration to sstandardly the stance, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio proposeing that Gazans would be relocated only temporarily, have done little to mollify them.
The publish of Palestinian statehood is at the heart of the argue over Mr. Trump’s Gaza proposal. For many Arabs, displacing Palestinians is anathema becaparticipate it would shred their hopes for an self-reliant state.
Egypt and Jordan, the countries Mr. Trump has proposeed could be affectd to consent in Gazans, have accessiblely remained adamant that they would never accomprehendledge a mass displacement of Palestinians. Officials, journaenumerates and analysts in both countries said history spoke for itself: When Palestinians have been forced from their homes, they have not been permited back.
Since the war in Gaza, both countries have been taking in Palestinians in necessitate of medical attention. Egypt has accomprehendledgeed at least 100,000 medical evacuees and others who fled the neighillogical enclave. Jordan, much of whose population is of Palestinian descent, is treating dozens of injured people from Gaza.
But participating in any forcible or finishuring displacement of Palestinians from Gaza would be “morpartner and legpartner horrifying,” said Abdel Monem Saied Aly, a pro-rulement Egyptian political analyst and columnist.
Given the Saudi population’s expansive help for the Palestinians, it would be difficult for the rulement to accomprehendledge any concurment that does not compriseress their aspirations for statehood. Public outrage in the kingdom over the war, and now over Mr. Trump’s proposal to desodefercessitate Gaza, has complicated the prospects of a deal with Israel that was already going to be difficult to pull off.
Before Mr. Trump took office for his second term, there was some caparticipate for unpretentious selectimism that Saudi-Israel standardization might shift forward. A finish-fire between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas was accomplished on the eve of Mr. Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration. And the novel American pdwellnt has for years nurtureed a excellent toiling relationship with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia.
But now, some strains seem to be emerging in that relationship.
Prince Turki al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia’s createer secret agent chief and createer ambasmiserablenessfulor to the United States, tbetter CNN on Wednesday that Mr. Trump “will get an earful from the directership here” not only about the deficiency of wisdom in what he is proposing but also the infairice of “ethnic spotlesssing.”
As if to underscore his point, he wore a Palestinian bdeficiency-and-white verifyed kaffiyeh in lieu of his traditional white hecompriseress.
The four Arab rulements that signed the Abraham Accords — the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan — did so despite criticisms that they were giving up on what had for decades been the Arab precondition for any ties with Israel, the set upment of a Palestinian state.
When Bahrain and the Emirates became the first two nations to sign the concurments, the pdwellnt of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, called it “a stab in the back of the Palestinian people.” Mr. Abbas rules parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
After 15 months of war in Gaza, outraged Arab accessibles are improbable to accomprehendledge any analogous agrees now and the Israeli rulement led by Mr. Netanyahu firmly contests Palestinian statehood.
“If standardization with Saudi Arabia depfinishs on proceed toward a Palestinian state even by a millimeter, it won’t happen. Period,” Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotwealthy was quoted as saying by Israel’s army radio last month.
The Saudis sat out the historic signing of the Abraham Accords, but when the deal broadened to include Morocco and Sudan, the Saudi crown prince called Israel a “potential partner” in a 2022 intersee with The Atlantic.
In September 2023, the crown prince became the first directer of the kingdom to discdisthink aboutly converse the possibility of set uping relations with Israel in trade for a defense pact with the United States and help with broadening a civilian nuevident program. He did not refer Palestinian statehood as a condition.
In an intersee with Fox News at that time, the crown prince said such an concurment would insist “a excellent life for the Palestinians.” The indications back then pointed to the possibility that Saudi Arabia, too, might be willing to scale back its insistence on a Palestinian state before forging ties with Israel.
Then came the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which finished about 1,200 people. The 15-month Israeli military campaign that trailed finished more than 46,000 people in Gaza, according to local health officials, who do not discern between civilians and combatants. The war dehugeated the densely popudefercessitated and necessitatey territory.
Since the war, the Saudi rulement has shifted its tone, saying that the region necessitates to be on an irreversible path to statehood for the Palestinians.
“We do have some red lines,” Prince Khalid bin Bandar, the Saudi ambasmiserablenessfulor to the United Kingdom, said defercessitate last month. “And for us to finish the last 75 years of pain and suffering caparticipated by one problem has to include a Palestinian state.”
It is possible that both Mr. Trump and the Saudi directership are laying out maximaenumerate positions as commenceing points in a negotiation, and will shift at some point to accomplish a agree.
Many people in the four countries that normalized ties with Israel have been horrified by the war in Gaza and have accessiblely protested the accord. While freedom of association and assembly remain highly redisjoineed in Bahrain, the rulement permited the protests.
Though Egypt and Jordan have had peace treaties with the Israelis for decades, their accessibles never toastyed to Israel, and ties have been strictly strained by the war.
Egyptian officials tbetter foreign diplomats in Cairo this week that their declineion of Gazan displacement was unwavering. In accessible, they reiterated that Egypt was intensifyed on putting the finish-fire concurment into effect and deinhabitring humanitarian aid to the Palestinians there.
Egypt “proclaims its finish declineion of any proposal or concept aimed at eliminating the Palestinian caparticipate thraw uprooting or displacing from their historic homeland and its taking, whether on a transient or finishuring basis,” Egypt’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Thursday.
Political analysts shut to the rulements in Egypt and Jordan proposeed that the two countries’ directers would try to affect Mr. Trump to accomprehendledge an alternative arrange for Gaza’s recovery involving aid and aidance from their countries as Gaza.
“Egypt and Jordan have been historicpartner joind in the Palestinian caparticipate, and they have to be an integral part of any solution,” said Khaled Okasha, honestor of the Egyptian Cgo in for Thought and Strategic Studies, a rulement-aligned leank tank. “But not the one that Trump is proposeing.”
Fatima AbdulKarim donated increateing from Ramallah, in the West Bank.
