President-elect Donald Trump’s pro-Israel views likely influenced the outcome of Sunday’s Paris Mideast summit, a Fatah official told Breitbart Jerusalem, leading to what the official termed a modestly worded resolution at the confab’s conclusion.
“Indeed, the outcome of the summit was overall positive but we expected it to lay out concrete parameters that would translate our resolutions into operative steps, but because the participating governments didn’t want to confront Trump they didn’t go that far,” said Tayseer Nasrallah, a member of Fatah’s Revolutionary Council.
“Declaring a Palestinian State in the 1967 borders, a resolution against the settlements, their commitment to the creation of a Palestinian state … all this is fine and well, but sadly we don’t see a mechanism that would usher in the implementation,” he said. “It’s hard to predict what Trump will do. But based on his election pledges, he is unlikely to be committed to (Secretary of State John) Kerry’s parameters and the Paris resolutions. It’s hard to predict his Middle East policy altogether, including moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, but if that happens it will definitely give an indication of his ideas regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
Nasrallah said that in preparing for the Paris summit “there was excellent coordination between the Palestinian Authority and the Obama administration. There was excellent coordination with France. But again, the question that arises is whether the Trump Administration will allow the community of nations to implement the resolution or not.”
More than 70 nations attended the Paris summit, where they affirmed the international community’s commitment to creating a Palestinian state. Reports in the Israeli news media credited the Jewish state’s diplomats with helping to temper the language of the summit’s final declaration, calling the text a “significant weakening” and “less harsh than was initially expected.”
The Fatah official is not the only one to comment on the incoming Trump administration’s influence over the Paris summit outcome.
The Guardian newspaper on Sunday ran with a story titled, “UK signals closeness to Trump with snub to French Middle East summit.”
The newspaper reported:
The British government has signaled its determination to stay close to Donald Trump’s administration by refusing to send a high-level delegation to the Middle East peace conference organised by the French government.
Neither a Foreign Office minister, nor the UK ambassador to France, will be attending the meeting on Sunday. Most large EU countries have sent their foreign minister, and the British approach may hint at future UK policy choices. The French regard the conference as a vital chance to reaffirm the case for a negotiated two-state solution between the Israelis and Palestinians.
Trump’s transition team reportedly told French diplomats they disapproved of the conference going ahead, seeing it as an attempt to put unfair pressure on Israel and give an unjustified reward to the Palestinians. The British government likely fears that the conference risks becoming a means to circumscribe future US policy on Israel before the Trump team has decided on it.
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