Abbas hopeful after Trump meeting

RAMALLAH, West Bank — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said his first meeting with President Donald Trump left him hopeful.

Abbas said he believes the Trump administration can play an important role as a mediator, and Trump restated his ambition to facilitate the deal that has eluded negotiators for more than two decades.

Yet Abbas does not appear to have secured U.S. backing for pressure on Israel to end settlement construction in the lands the Palestinians claim for a future state — a key goal for the Palestinian leader.

Still, the fact that the meeting was held was an improvement for Abbas over the early weeks of the Trump administration. And Trump has not yet acted on his claim that he would move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, which the Palestinians oppose.

Trump struck an optimistic note Wednesday, saying he believes an Israeli-Palestinian deal can be reached. He did not explain what type of solution he envisions.

Abbas told reporters after the White House meeting that “what is needed is to bring the two parties together, to bring them closer and then to facilitate things between them.”

The Palestinians want to set up a state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, lands Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war. Abbas reiterated the demand as he stood next to Trump at the White House.

However, there have been no serious negotiations since gaps widened with the 2009 election of Benjamin Netanyahu as Israel’s prime minister. Netanyahu rejects the 1967 frontier as a baseline for border talks and rules out a partition of Jerusalem where Palestinians hope to establish a capital. The Netanyahu government, like those before it, have expanded settlements on war-won lands, despite U. S. appeals to curb construction.

Despite the lack of specifics, Abbas described his meeting with Trump as positive and said that “we build hopes on it.”

“So far, we didn’t talk about a mechanism, but the contacts between us and the Americans began and will continue,” he said.

Abbas said he is ready to meet with Netanyahu and suggested the Israeli leader is avoiding such talks.

“We had planned to meet in Moscow, but he didn’t show up,” Abbas said, referring to Russian efforts several months ago to set up such a meeting.

Netanyahu has said he is willing to meet with Abbas. In the past, Abbas balked at the idea of such a summit, saying it would be pointless without general agreement on the framework of negotiations and a significant curb in settlement construction. Abbas did not explain his apparent shift in position.

On Thursday, Netanyahu said he looks forward to discussing with Trump the “best ways to advance peace.”

Trump announced Thursday that he would make his first trip abroad as president later this month, traveling to Saudi Arabia, then Israel, and the Vatican, before attending a NATO summit in Brussels on May 25.