RAMALLAH, May 12, 2018 (WAF) – Palestinian analysts strongly criticized the US plan to relocate its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, saying that US President Donald Trump has rewarded Palestinians‘ years of patience by handing Israel everything it wants on a silver platter.
Diana Buttu, a Ramallah-based political analyst and former advisor to President Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian negotiators, said the Palestinians, who have waited decades for the world to finally enforce the hundreds of UN resolutions condemning Israel’s systematic abuses of Palestinian rights in Jerusalem and beyond, "are now being rewarded for their patience by Trump handing Israel everything it wants on a silver platter."
She warned that the US move will encourage Israel to accelerate its attempts to erase the Palestinian presence from occupied Jerusalem by destroying their homes and stealing their land for illegal settlements.
“While Trump claims that a ‘deal of the century‘ is on the horizon, he has sabotaged any hopes of achieving it with this move,” said Buttu. “It should come as no surprise that he has more support in an alt-right supporting Israel than he does at home: he wishes to push a war agenda that aligns with Israel’s regional plans.”
The message is clear, she said, “the Trump administration stands by Israel and its abuses of Palestinian human rights, not by Palestinians seeking their freedom.”
Yousef Munayyer, political analyst at the Arab Center of Washington, DC, and executive director of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, said Trump will mark the anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba, the dispersal and displacement of Palestinians from their homeland 70 years ago, by opening a US embassy in Jerusalem.
“This decision is not merely a reversal in US policy as it relates to Jerusalem, but the timing can only be understood by Palestinians as a deliberate and emphatic attempt to add insult to injury, not by the Israelis, but by the Americans who seek to claim the role of mediator between the Israelis and Palestinians,” he said.
“These events demonstrate clearly that in fact (Israeli Prime Minister) Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump are partners in crimes against the Palestinians and other people around the world.”
Nur Arafeh, Policy Fellow of Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network, said the inauguration of the US Embassy in Jerusalem the day before Palestinians commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Nakba, when nearly a million Palestinians were driven from their homes during Israel’s establishment, is a reminder that the embassy move is not simply an aberration.
“Rather, it is part of a continuing structure of colonialism, displacement, and injustice that is sustained by the complicity of the US and other countries. From the Balfour declaration in 1917 to the Nakba in 1948; from Israel’s 50-year-old military rule over the occupied West Bank, Gaza Strip and Golan Heights, and the illegal annexation of East Jerusalem, to Israel’s ongoing policies of dispossession, fragmentation and exploitation; from Israel’s cracking down on the ‘Great March of Return‘ in Gaza to its ongoing efforts to destroy the Palestinian community of Umm al-Hiran in southern Israel. All this reminds us that the Nakba continues today, and will likely get worse as a result of Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.”
M.K.
