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The President of the United States Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released details of their Middle East peace plan. Point to be noted that Palestinian leaders boycott the meeting. Trump praised Netanyahu for his courage to take this bold step forward. Trump said, “But that’s no big deal because I already did that for you”. Jerusalem would be under total Israeli control under this White House plan. It denies Palestinians their aspiration to have the whole of east Jerusalem as their capital. The Palestinians would have their capital within east Jerusalem in this new plan. Trump said, “We will never ask Israel to compromise its security. We can’t do that”. Trump predicted the plan would create 1 million new Palestinian jobs and wipe out poverty in the group’s areas.

Trump also asked the Palestinians to meet the challenges of peaceful coexistence, including cracking down on the actions of and financing for groups like Hamas. Netanyahu meanwhile lauded the plan as a reasonable path to sustainable peace. He said it was the first plan to fully recognize Israel’s need for security. He said previous plans failed to strike the right balance. Those plans proposed an Israeli exit from the Jordanian Valley. Presence in those areas allows Israel to defend itself in his usual booming cadence. Netanyahu also admired Trump for being the first world leader to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over all its settlements of the occupied West Bank.

Israeli settlements are considered illegal under international law. Netanyahu also said, “Israeli must have sovereignty over the Jordan Valley and other strategic areas of the West Bank because it was vital to our security”. He said he acknowledged it might take the Palestinian side a very long time to arrive at the start of a path to peace. One of the major barriers to Palestinians accepting this plan is the denial of their right to return to homelands lost in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Netanyahu added this plan makes clear that the Palestinian refugee problem must be solved outside the state of Israel.