United States President Donald Trump’s closely guarded Middle East plan is expected to be publicized following Israel’s April 9 national elections.
According to a Channel 13 News report, based on information from a source who took part in a Washington briefing by a senior White House official, the secret plan will call for the partition of the Holy Land into two separate states and divide Jerusalem into three.
The Trump plan will aim to establish a Fatah-run Palestinian state on nearly 90% of the West Bank, the destruction of many small Jewish villages and an Israeli annexation of the largest Israeli towns and cities in the territories.
Sizable Jewish communities deeper in the West Bank would not be demolished according to the plan, but no further building would be permitted, in order to “dry them out.”
Regarding Jerusalem, the report revealed that Trump wants to see the city divided into the capitals of both states, with the Old City administered jointly by Israeli, Palestinians, Jordanians and Western countries.
According to the report, the Trump administration expects the Palestinian Authority to reject the plan when it is presented but for Israel to submit to American demands.
Trump has spent months positioning the Israeli and Palestinian political leaderships for a successful implementation of his plan.
By moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem last May in such an ostentatious and divisive manner that played in the international press as a major Israeli diplomatic triumph over the Palestinians, the American president fostered a political atmosphere in which Israel owes his administration big.
By diplomatically indebting Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu (Likud) to his administration and beating PA President Mahmoud Abbas into submission, Trump seems to believe he can succeed where his predecessors have failed in partitioning Israel into two states, each dependent on American power for survival.
Following the revelation of the Channel 13 News report, many right-wing Jewish figures rushed to Trump’s defense by claiming the rumors to be fabricated.
But such reports should be regarded as test balloons from the administration to gauge reactions from Jewish communities both in Israel and the US. It therefore makes sense for Jews to loudly protest the plan and make clear their opposition before the plan is officially announced. Reaction to the reports – whether fabricated or not – could help determine how far Trump feels he could push Israel’s government.
Rather than rushing to defend Trump and dismiss reports of his regional agenda as false, those troubled by the notion of his administration forcing partition on Israel should be expressing their outrage as aggressively as possible. The lack of such outrage could only serve to convinced the administration that a plan based on America’s traditional two-state formula and the division of Jerusalem could somehow be acceptable to the Jewish people.
