In West Bank, Biden embraces ‘two states for two peoples’
BETHLEHEM: President Joe Biden acknowledged Friday that an independent state for Palestinians can seem so far away as he confronted hopelessness about the stagnant peace process during a visit to the West Bank.
The Palestinian people are hurting now, he said. You can just feel it. Your grief and frustration. In the United States, we can feel it.
Biden commented during a joint appearance in Bethlehem with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Although he’s announced 316 million in financial assistance for the Palestinians during his visit, there’s no clear path to getting peace talks back on track.
Even if the ground is not ripe at this moment to restart negotiations, the United States and my administration will not give up on bringing the Palestinians and the Israelis, both sides, closer together, he said.
Biden said the “Palestinian people deserve a state of their own that’s independent, sovereign, viable and contiguous. Two states for two peoples, both of whom have deep and ancient roots in this land, living side by side in peace and security.
Abbas, in his own remarks, said it was time to turn the page on the Israeli occupation on our land.” He also said Israel cannot continue to act as a state above law.
Biden was welcomed to
Bethlehem by a pair of Palestinian children, who gave him a bouquet of flowers, and a band that played the U.S. national anthem.
Earlier in the day, he appeared at the East Jerusalem Hospital Network, which serves Palestinians, to discuss financial assistance for local healthcare. He’s proposed 100 million, which requires U.S. congressional approval, in addition to 201 million for the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, plus smaller amounts for other assorted programs.
Israel has also committed to upgrading wireless networks in the West Bank and Gaza, part of a broader effort to improve economic conditions.
Palestinians and Israelis deserve equal measures of freedom, security, prosperity and dignity, he said. And access to healthcare, when you need it, is essential to living a life of dignity for all of us.
When Biden finished speaking at the hospital, a woman who identified herself as a pediatric nurse at another healthcare facility thanked him for the financial assistance but said we need more justice, more dignity.
Biden’s trip to the West Bank is being met with skepticism and bitterness among Palestinians who believe Biden has taken too few steps toward rejuvenating peace talks, especially after President Donald Trump sidelined them while heavily favoring Israel.
The last serious round of negotiations aimed at creating an independent Palestinian state broke down more than a decade ago, leaving millions of Palestinians living under Israeli military rule.