Palestinians reject Kushner’s ‘economy first’ approach

Palestinian officials on Saturday dismissed proposals unveiled by President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner for big money projects to form the first economic portion of the Trump administration’s long-awaited Middle East peace plan.

Senior Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) official Hanan Ashrawi said Kushner’s plans were “all abstract promises” and said only a political solution would solve the conflict.

Hamas, the hardliner militant group that controls Gaza, was more blunt, saying: “Palestine isn’t for sale”.

The Trump administration’s $50 billion Middle East economic plan calls for creation of a global investment fund to lift the Palestinian and neighbouring Arab state economies, according to US officials and documents reviewed by Reuters.

One proposal is for the construction of a $5 billion transportation corridor to connect the West Bank and Gaza.

The “peace to prosperity” plan is set to be presented at an international conference in Bahrain next week by Kushner, who told Reuters that Palestinian leaders should consider the initiative.

“This is going to be the ‘Opportunity of the Century’ if they have the courage to pursue it,” he said.

However Ashrawi, a veteran Palestinian negotiator and member of the executive committee of the PLO, said only a political solution that ended Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian Territories would solve the conflict.

Speaking to Reuters by phone from the West Bank city of Ramallah, she said: “If they really care about the Palestinian economy they should start by lifting the siege of Gaza, stopping Israel stealing our money and our resources and our land and opening up our territorial waters, our air space and our borders so we can freely export and import.”

She said the Trump administration’s stance was an “entirely wrong approach”, adding: “They can end the occupation, which is the most basic requirement for prosperity. There can be no prosperity under occupation.”

No Palestinian officials belonging to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ PLO and Palestinian Authority will attend the conference in Bahrain.

The White House said it decided against inviting the Israeli government because the PA would not be there. Several Gulf Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, will participate in the June 25-26 US-led gathering in Manama.

An Egyptian delegation headed by a deputy finance minister will participate in a Bahrain summit on Palestinian economic development, the state news agency MENA quoted the foreign ministry spokesman as saying on Saturday.

The “peace to prosperity” economic summit will be held in on June 25-26 in cooperation with the United States.

Their presence, some US officials say privately, appears intended in part to curry favour with Trump as he takes a hard line against Iran, those countries’ regional arch-foe.

The economic revival plan would take place only if a political solution to the region’s long-running problems is reached.

More than half of the $50 billion would be spent in the economically troubled Palestinian territories over 10 years while the rest would be split between Egypt, Lebanon and Jordan.

Some of the projects would be in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula, where investments could benefit Palestinians living in adjacent Gaza, a crowded and impoverished coastal enclave.

In Gaza, Hamas official Ismail Rudwan also rejected Kushner’s proposals.

The armed hardliner group is the main internal rival to Abbas, whose power base is in the West Bank. But both are in rare agreement over the Trump administration.

“We reject the ‘deal of the century’ and all its dimensions, the economic, the political and the security dimensions,” Rudwan told Reuters.

“The issue of our Palestinian people is a nationalistic issue, it is the issue of a people who are seeking to be free from occupation. Palestine isn’t for sale, and it is not an issue for bargaining. Palestine is a sacred land and there is no option for the occupation except to leave,” he said.

The White House cast the plan − to be discussed in more detail in Bahrain with finance chiefs of oil-rich Gulf Arab states − as historic.

“Peace to Prosperity represents the most ambitious and comprehensive international effort for the Palestinian people to date,” the White House said in the economic plan.

Agencies