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Report: leaked draft of Trump’s peace plan reveals creation of ‘New Palestine,’ promises to join Israel in next war in Gaza if Palestinians reject

A leaked document of “main points” from the Trump administration’s so-called “deal of the century” was published today by Yisrael Hayom, outlining a plan for a two-state solution that includes the creation of a demilitarized state of “New Palestine,” Israeli annexation of all settlements in the West Bank, a land deal with Egypt, and shared capitals in Jerusalem.

If either Israel or the Palestinians, including Hamas and the PLO, reject the deal, the document says the U.S. will impose steep penalties. The U.S. will cut off all aid to Israel and ensure “no country in the world transfers money” to the Palestinians, whose economy is reliant on foreign donors.

If the PLO accepts the plan and Hamas or Islamic Jihad in Gaza reject it, the document warns “the U.S. will back Israel to personally harm leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad” in a future escalation, and will hold Hamas’ leadership “responsible in another round of violence between Israel and Hamas.”

The plan goes on to caution, “It is inconceivable that a group of a few dozen will determine the lives of millions of people,” which echoes similar sentiments made by Kushner last week.

Yisrael Hayom reported the document was shared by officials in Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, although the newspaper could not confirm the identify of the drafter or authenticate the details of the peace plan. It was published with the caveat “Here’s the message. You judge,” and a response from an unnamed senior White House official who is quoted as calling the report “speculative” and “inaccurate.”

Mondoweiss was not able to independently verify the accuracy of the document. Some of the line items in the agreement are consistent with previous reporting on unconfirmed details of deal, others are contradictions.

While the plan includes a general framework for final status issues such as borders and Jerusalem, as Kushner said his deal would last week, it also is comprised of specific details for an economic relationship between the proposed Palestinian state and Israel. A toll road in the West Bank, and the Palestinians would pay Israel a sum for providing security.

The deal includes significant financial support from the U.S., Europe and the Gulf states to the new Palestinian state, to a tune of $30 billion over five years, with additional support for specific development projects from Australia, Canada, Japan and South Korea. Most of the funding will come from “oil producing countries,” described as “the main beneficiaries of this agreement.”

Creation of a “New Palestine”

The plan calls for the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, and cedes all territory held by Israeli settlements and settlement blocs to Israel. Likely, this would mean the plan would annex a majority of Area C of the West Bank, around 62 percent. The entirety of the Jordan Valley, about 30 percent of the West Bank, will be annexed to Israel. It is unclear if the Palestinians who reside there, around 65,000, will become citizens of the state of Israel. The plan further states the main highway in the Jordan Valley, Route 90, “will turn into a four-lane toll road.” It is unclear if Palestinians will have access to this road.

The Palestinian state will control two international borders with Jordan, likely turning over the Israeli controlled Allenby crossing between the West Bank and Jordan.

New Palestine will have a local police force who will be allowed to hold “light weapons.” The new Palestinian state will be prevented from forming a military. Israel will be responsible for security for a fee paid by the Palestinian government.

Jerusalem as a shared capital

Jerusalem will be a shared capital for both Israel and New Palestine. The deal underscores that Jerusalem “will not be divided.”

Today Jerusalem is home to some 350,000 Palestinian residents who are neither citizens of Israel or West Bank residents, and 550,000 Israelis, including around 200,000 settlers in East Jerusalem. Under the agreement all Israelis and Palestinians will be able to stay where they are living, but Israelis will no longer be able to purchase homes from Palestinians, potentially abruptly ending future expansion of East Jerusalem settlements. The deal would also bar Palestinians from buying homes from Israelis, which they are currently able to do.

The Palestinians in Jerusalem would become citizens of “New Palestine,” but receive the same services as Israeli residents of Jerusalem from the Jerusalem municipality, governed by Israel. The plans says the Palestinian Authority will be responsible for paying the municipality for services, with the exception of schools, which will be run by the Palestinian government.

Land lease from Egypt

While previous peace accords have agreed to principles of land swaps between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the Trump deal reportedly calls on a lease of territory from Egypt for the creation of an airport and industrial zone.

“Egypt will lease new land to Palestine for the purpose of establishing an airport for the establishment of factories and commerce, and for agriculture, other than housing,” the plan said, “The size of the territories and the price will be determined between the parties through the mediation of the supporting countries.”

Under the deal Gaza would significantly open up to the outside world, albeit with the removal of Hamas’ military capabilities. Hamas would be required to turn over all weapons to Egypt.

Within one year New Palestine would hold elections where “every Palestinian citizen will be able to stand for election.”

The agreement notes “all the borders of the Strip will be open to the passage of goods and workers to Israel.” Gaza will be accessible to the West Bank through the creation of a land bridge.

The plan includes an additional Palestinian demands from past negotiations. Palestinian prisoners will be released over the course of three years. However, Palestinian refugees who today number some 7 million are excluded entirely from the document.

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Just a few notes on this leak of the ‘Deal of the Century’.
“New Palestine will have a local police force who will be allowed to hold “light weapons.” The new Palestinian state will be prevented from forming a military. Israel will be responsible for security for a fee paid by the Palestinian government”.
It would appear that the “New Palestine” will not be a sovereign state nor one that could reapply for UN membership based on these new parameters, with US backing this time, therefore cancelling its present membership of the UN, in other words the occupation will continue because” Israel will be responsible for security” only now the Palestinians will pay for it.
“If the PLO accepts the plan and Hamas or Islamic Jihad in Gaza reject it, the document warns “the U.S. will back Israel to personally harm leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad”.
In other words if Hamas does not agree with the plan, We, Israel/US will personally harm them i.e. we will kill them. IF Netanyahu does not agree will he be killed?
“It is inconceivable that a group of a few dozen will determine the lives of millions of people,”
Is it inconceivable for a group of men Trump, Bolton, Pompeo and Abrams to determine the fate of 350 million American citizens and the well being of the rest of the planet?
“Today Jerusalem is home to some 350,000 Palestinian residents who are neither citizens of Israel or West Bank residents”
Today, East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian territory as per International Law.
Palestinian refugees who today number some 7 million are excluded entirely from the document.
No right of return, contrary to International Law.
All in all, a disgraceful set of proposals which should never see the light of day.

Anyone accepting anything from the U.S. government would have to be severely brain damaged. From 1778 to 1871, the United States government entered into more than 500 treaties with the Native American tribes; all of these treaties have since been violated in some way or outright broken by the US government. I hope the Palestinian leadership will pick up a history book and understand with whom it is dealing.

https://www.lawfareblog.com/israels-new-plan-annex-west-bank-what-happens-next

“Israel’s New Plan to Annex the West Bank: What Happens Next?” LAWFARE, May 7/19, by Yuval Shany**

“On April 6, three days before the Israeli elections, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was interviewed on Israeli TV Channel 12. When asked about his policy regarding the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) he replied: ‘I will not uproot a single settlement, and I will ensure that we’ll control all the area West of the Jordan river. Will we move to the next stage? The answer is yes, we will move to the next stage—to the gradual extension of Israeli sovereignty in the areas of Judea and Samaria. I also do not distinguish between the settlement blocs and the lone settlements, every settlement like that is for me Israeli.’

“Although dismissed by commentators as a last-minute election gimmick designed to divert votes from small right-wing parties to Netanyahu’s Likud Party, the statement on annexation does in fact reflect the official policy of the Likud Party. On Dec. 31,2017, 1,500 delegates to the Likud Party congress voted unanimously in favor of a resolution calling on Likud elected officials to ‘take action to facilitate unlimited construction and to apply the laws of Israel and its sovereignty over all the liberated settlement zones in Judea and Samaria.’

“The Likud-led bloc of right-wing and religious parties won a significant majority in Parliament (65 seats out of 120) in the election. Now, the move in the direction of annexation is politically feasible. Already, one of the nascent coalition parties—the Union of Right-Wing Parties (representing national-religious Jews and settlers)—has put the passage of annexing legislation as one of its key demands for joining the coalition. Although it is improbable that any unilateral step of this nature will be undertaken before the publication of the Trump administration’s peace plan, the likelihood of annexation would increase considerably if that plan fails.

“What Kind of Annexation?”
“Neither Netanyahu’s pre-election statement nor the Likud 2017 resolution provided any specific details on the planned annexation or the method for its attainment. Under Israeli constitutional law, the extension of Israeli law to new swaths of territory can be facilitated through a ministerial decree (if the land in question is located within mandatory Palestine/Eretz Israel) or through a specific act of legislation. The annexation of East Jerusalem in 1967 was made through a governmental decision, later ratified by a Basic Law (titled ‘Basic Law: Jerusalem the Capital of Israel,’ passed in 1980 and amended in 2000). The annexation of the Golan Heights was done in 1981 through a specific legislative act.

“Given popular support among center-right-wing voters for annexation of the settlement blocs, the new coalition will probably try to force the opposition to take a stand on this question. Because of this, the coalition is more likely than not to authorize any annexation through a specific act of legislation. Such legislation could be modeled after private bills, submitted to the Knesset between 2016 and 2018, which attempted to extend the application of Israeli law to specific settlements, the Jordan River valley or all settlement blocs. These bills were never adopted due to the outgoing government’s concern about their diplomatic fallout and security implications.

“The language of the private bills submitted in recent years deviates from the language used in the 1981 Golan Heights Law in two respects. First, unlike the Golan Heights Law—and, before that, the 1967 decision on East Jerusalem—which only alluded to extension of Israeli law, jurisdiction and administration to the territory in question, the draft bills also refer explicitly to extension of Israeli sovereignty. The distinction between formal extension of sovereignty and ‘mere’ extension of legal and administrative powers has allowed Israel to claim in the past, somewhat insincerely, that it did not engage in the de jure annexation of new territory. But the new coalition has no interest in such pretense.

“Already today, many norms of Israeli law apply to the settlements—either through application of personal jurisdiction over the settlers, or through military decrees that incorporated Israeli law into the law applicable to all or parts of the West Bank. In the 2004 Wall advisory opinion, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) alluded to Israel’s actions in the settlement blocs, which separated the blocs from rest of the West Bank, as de facto annexation. What those in favor of annexation now seek is the mostly symbolic act of de jure annexation.

“Second, and more significantly, the new annexation plans found in some of the private bills and endorsed by Netanyahu appear to be targeted only at specifically designated parts of the West Bank, in particular the municipal jurisdiction areas of the different Jewish settlements in the West Bank. They would exclude areas populated by Palestinians. This differs from the Golan Heights Law, which covered the whole geographic area of the Golan, including villages populated by Golan Druze (who held Syrian nationality).

“Non-Israelis in the Golan were invited to naturalize in Israel, though only some 10 percent of them chose to do so. The West Bank annexation plans are not expected to afford nearby Palestinians a similar option. By targeting only areas populated by Israelis, the planned annexation would try to deflect some of the domestic criticism against the demographic implications of annexation—i.e., the feared transformation of Israel into a bi-national state. Since citizenship would not be extended to Palestinians residing outside the annexed areas, there would allegedly be no demographic implications.

“At the same time, the plan would create numerous Israeli enclaves in the West Bank. It is not clear right now whether adjacent open areas, such as the access roads leading to them, including roads used by Israelis and Palestinians, will be annexed as well. Notably, some right-wing politicians have also called for annexing all Area C lands—which represent most open land areas in the West Bank and are sparsely populated by Palestinians.

“Legal Issues”
“Three principal sets of issues need to be considered when reviewing the legality under international law of the planned annexation of settlements/settlement blocs. First, such a move appears to run contrary to the inadmissibility of acquisition of territory by war. This principle is articulated in the preamble to U.N. Security Council Resolution 242 (1967); in multiple U.N. resolutions proclaiming the status of the West Bank as occupied Palestinian territory and expressing opposition to any change in the status of the territory not agreed to by the parties through negotiation; and in the ICJ advisory opinion on the Wall, which rejected the de facto annexation of part of the West Bank.

“The current annexation plans draw on the Trump administration’s recent recognition of Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights. Arguably, the unique circumstances cited by the U.S. as justification for annexation in the Golan case—occupation in a defensive war and the presence of an ongoing security threat—would be relied upon in the context of the West Bank too. While the U.S. position had been heavily criticized internationally, it may give Israel the political cover it needs to avoid some of the diplomatic repercussions of the annexation. Or at the very least, the Israeli government may believe this to be the case. Significantly, unlike in the Golan Heights, Israel has never recognized the sovereignty of any other political entity in the West Bank—and this may lead it to have fewer inhibitions in asserting its sovereignty there.

“Second, the annexation plans run directly contrary to the Oslo Accords—and more generally to the two-state vision that both parties, including Israel under Netanyahu, accepted in the past. The unilateral creation of Israeli sovereign enclaves runs contrary to the obligation to negotiate a permanent status arrangement with the Palestinians, and effectively creates Palestinian enclaves in the nonannexed area with limited contiguity and almost certainly no sustainable viability as an independent state. This division of territorial control looks more like the South African system of Bantustans than the foundation of a viable two-state solution.

“Third, the annexation plans will perpetuate Israel’s control over large parts of the West Bank, effectively subjecting the Palestinian residents living next to the annexed areas to its authority on a day-to-day and permanent basis. These residents will be dependent on Israel regarding their movement and in connection to their basic rights to health, work, family life and more. Involuntarily subjecting a large local population to the power and authority of a foreign state—without providing that population with the right to naturalize and to partake in the design of government policies that affect daily life—raises significant questions of democratic legitimacy. If indeed the annexation plans result in extensive de facto control over West Bank Palestinians, then the decision not to de jure annex their villages does not fully resolve the demographic challenge they pose. And it leaves in place the aforementioned democratic deficit.

“This situation will result in a continuous state of affairs in which two sets of laws apply to two adjacent populations: one able to exercise the full rights attendant to citizenship, and the other barred from those rights. Such a development could push Israel over the edge, from a democracy toward a regime whose laws de facto underlie a structural and permanent system of ethnic discrimination.”
___________________________________________________________________________________

**Professor Yuval Shany is the Hersch Lauterpacht Chair in International Law and former Dean of the Law Faculty of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He also currently serves as Vice President for Research at the Israel Democracy Institute, and as a member of the UN Human Rights Committee.

i thought the most interesting part, aside from palestinians having to pay for their own occupation (Israel will be responsible for security for a fee paid by the Palestinian government.), was the threat if they refused. listen how both sidey this starts out:

If either Israel or the Palestinians, including Hamas and the PLO, reject the deal, the document says the U.S. will impose steep penalties.

never mind that it essentially gives israel everything it wants so why would they reject it? then it goes on to say “The U.S. will cut off all aid to Israel” (3.8 billion a year) but nothing about sanctions, nothing about ensuring “no country in the world transfers money” or trades with israel. no, that part is just reserved for to Palestinians.

and if palestinians don’t go along the US will make war on gaza. i mean, how is this any way to make a deal?

The plan goes on to caution, “It is inconceivable that a group of a few dozen will determine the lives of millions of people,”

no it’s not, that’s exactly what they did. under threat of war it’s very conceivable. they are letting palestinians lease a country in egypt.

So…I just read through the “plan” and had multiple realizations.
The most glaring was the whole, “do as I say or we will punish you” part. It seems a bit narcissistic and a bit sociopathic. Not how you influence foreign countries or people trying to become a country.
The meat of the plan gets some cool points for someone taking the initiative to “try” to come up with a solution. 10 points for initiative, right? At least someone, has a plan.
The last fact that illuminated itself was all the flack from the Left. Hilariously every damn person on the planet knows that no Democrat will ever back anything a Republican dreams up even if it’s a great idea because they want all the credit for any positive social achievements.
Had Lord Obama dreamt up this “plan” the left would be jizzing all over themselves. You know it’s true. Just like Bill Clinton, Hillary and Obama called for building a border wall and getting tough on illegal immigration and as soon as a Right politician does it hes a racist. Humans suck.