President Trump Peace Strategy: Emerging Conflict Between Israel and Palestine

Abstract

When Donald Trump was elected as US President in November 2016, he initially signaled some real hope for the peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some analysts argued that he may actually manage to deliver what he calls "the deal of the century" and bring peace to Israel and Palestine. These assumptions were based on the fact that  President Trump is the type of person that could wake up one morning, say "enough", and pressure Israeli and Palestinian leaders to sign a peace deal on his terms. Early on in his presidency, Trump made the conflict a strategic priority and unconventionally chose to go to the Middle East (Saudi Arabia, Israel and Palestine) on his first trip abroad as President. During a press conference with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Bethlehem, he said that "if Israel and the Palestinians can make peace, it will begin a process of peace all throughout the Middle East." This was in line with Europe's standard inside-out approach (Israeli-Palestinian peace first, Israeli-Arab normalization later). But on December 2019, Trump made it clear that his much-anticipated peace deal will favour Israel when he recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital and promised to move the US embassy there. This led Abbas to brand Trump's peace efforts as "the slap of the century" and say the US could no longer play any role in the Middle East peace process following the move. This paper has general objective of appraising the Trump peace deal in Middle East, and evaluate it to see does the process would bring real peace or escalation of crisis in the Middle East. The paper has argued that for peace to be guaranteed in the Middle East, justice, fair play and inclusiveness must be demonstrated by any third party who want intervene and bring peace in the Middle East.

Keywords: Conflict, Middle East, Peace Deal, US intervention

DOI: 10.7176/IAGS/82-04

Publication date:May 31^st 2020