What's in Trump's Middle East peace plan

More than two years after he first proposed a plan to revive the longmoribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process, U.S. President Donald Trump released details on Tuesday of his proposal to solve a conflict that has frustrated peacemakers for decades.

- The status of Jerusalem, including historical sites sacred to Judaism, Islam and Christianity.

- Establishing mutually agreed borders.

- Finding security arrangements to satisfy Israeli fears of attacks by

Palestinians and hostile neighbours.

- The Palestinian demand for statehood in territory - the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem - captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East War.

- Finding a solution to the plight of millions of Palestinian refugees.

- Arrangements to share natural resources, such as water.

- Palestinian demands that Israel remove its settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. More than 400,000 Israelis now live among about 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank, with a further 200,000 settlers in East Jerusalem.

Under Trump’s proposals, the United States will recognise Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank. The White House released a statement immediately after Trump’s televised address outlining the main points:

- A map to set out borders for “a realistic two-state solution, offering a viable path to Palestinian statehood.”

- A demilitarised Palestinian state to live peacefully alongside Israel, but with strict conditions that Palestinians are likely to balk at.

- Israel agreed to a four-year “land freeze” to secure the possibility of a two-state solution. But a senior Israeli official later played down the notion of a settlement freeze.

- The status quo to be preserved at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount/al-Haram al-Sharif complex - which lies in the eastern part of the city captured by Israel in a 1967 war.

- Israel to “continue to safeguard” Jerusalem’s holy sites and to guarantee freedom of worship to Jews, Christians, Muslims and other faiths.

- Jerusalem to stay united and remain the capital of Israel.

- The capital of the State of Palestine to include areas of East Jerusalem. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said later the capital would be in Abu Dis, which lies a mile (1.6

Jerusalem’s Old City.

- An earlier - economic - part of the plan announced last June called for a $50 billion investment fund to boost the Palestinian and neighbouring Arab state economies.

Critics say both Trump and Netanyahu are intent on diverting attention away from domestic troubles. Trump has been impeached and is on trial in the U.S. Senate, while Netanyahu was indicted on corruption charges in November. Both deny wrongdoing. They also face re-election campaigns Netanyahu in March and Trump in November.

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