US won't release peace plan before Israel's elections, says envoy
The United States will not release the long-delayed political portion of its Israeli-Palestinian peace plan before Israel’s elections, the White House’s Middle East envoy, Jason Greenblatt, said on Wednesday.
The move appeared to be aimed at not interfering with September elections in which the leadership of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a close ally of Donald Trump, is at stake.
“We have decided that we will not be releasing the peace vision (or parts of it) prior to the Israeli election,” Greenblatt said on Twitter.
The US president on Monday had said the plan might be revealed before the Israeli election.
Trump’s Middle East team, including senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner, had wanted to roll out the political plan during the summer but Netanyahu’s failure to put together a governing coalition after April elections prompted a delay.
Netanyahu now faces a fresh vote on 17 September and, if successful, will try again to form a coalition. Unveiling a peace plan before 17 September could have complicated a tight race in which Netanyahu’s rightwing Likud party and its strongest rival – Blue and White, led by former armed forces chief Benny Gantz – are running neck and neck in the polls.
Netanyahu has praised Trump policy moves such as the transfer of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and its annexation of the occupied Golan Heights.
But any perceived concessions towards the Palestinians in the peace plan in the run-up to a ballot only three weeks away could have harmed Netanyahu’s chances of remaining in office.
Netanyahu has campaigned for votes partly by highlighting his close relationship with Trump, whom he has featured on election billboards.
The White House in June announced the economic piece of the Trump peace plan and sought support for it at a conference of global finance ministers in Bahrain.
It proposes a $50bn Middle East economic plan that would create a global investment fund to lift the Palestinian and neighboring Arab state economies, and fund a $5bn transportation corridor to connect the West Bank and Gaza.
Gulf leaders, however, want to see details of the political plan, which is aimed at resolving some of the thorniest issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, before signing on to the economic plan.