90% of Palestinians have no faith in US economic plan: Survey
- 03 Jul 2019
A poll published on Wednesday has revealed that 90 per cent Palestinians do not believe or trust the US government's recently unveiled economic plans.
US has claimed that the plan aims to improve Palestinians' economic wellbeing.
The economic part of the plan dubbed 'Peace to Prosperity was presented in the Bahraini capital Manama on June 25-26 by President Donald Trump's administration.
The Palestinians refused to attend the conference, accusing the US of systematic pro-Israel bias.
The poll carried out by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research and the first since the Manama conference, found overwhelming distrust of Washington.
Ninety per cent of the 1,200 people polled said they did not believe or trust Washington's claim that the Bahrain meetings aimed to improve Palestinians' economic conditions.
Both the Palestinian Authority and its rival Hamas − the hardliner group that runs the Gaza Strip − have lambasted the US economic plan as an attempt to buy them off, in return for foregoing any claim to their own state.
Trump's son-in-law and senior advisor Jared Kushner, who is leading the peace plan, has said he is seeking to reach out to ordinary Palestinians, bypassing their leaders.
But the survey also found 79 per cent of the Palestinian population supported their leaders' boycott of the conference, while just 15 per cent were opposed to that position.
More than three quarters believed the US plan would not bring prosperity to the Palestinian economy.
The poll also found three quarters of Palestinians wanted their leaders to outright reject the US plan.
Fifteen per cent said the plan should be accepted with reservations and just four per cent wanted to accept it without reservations.
The Trump administration has taken a series of steps that have stoked Palestinian anger, including recognising Jerusalem as Israel's capital in December 2017.
Palestinians consider the eastern part of the city the capital of their own future state and Trump's move broke with decades of consensus.
Agence France-Presse
