Global Geopolitical Series: Trump administration unlikely to succeed in bringing PA leaders to negotiate before U.S. mid-term election

It is looking increasingly likely that the United States would fail in bringing back the Palestinian Authority (PA) leaders to the negotiating table, who have left after the U.S. moved to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel late last year and refused to accept the United States as a sole unbiased mediator in the talks. We don’t expect the status quo to change at least not until the U.S. mid-term election on November.

The Trump administration in the United States recently ramped up pressure on the Palestinian Authority by taking the following actions,

• The United States announced that it would no longer provide $200 million in aid to United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
• The United States and Israel are now close in reaching an agreement with Hamas over truce along the Gaza border, which was recently fouled by PA leaders’ intervention and international lobbying. But a truce deal between Hamas and Israel would be a major setback for the PA leaders.
• The United States closed down Palestinian Liberation Organization’s (PLO) mission in Washington over its bid to have Israel investigated for war crimes at the International Criminal Court (ICC).
• The U.S. has also threatened to sanction ICC judges, should they decide against Israel or the United States over war crime.

However, despite U.S. pressure, the PA leader scored a victory this month as they successfully persuaded the new Paraguay government in scrapping its plans to follow U.S. footsteps in recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital by moving embassy.

The PA leaders are currently ‘wait it out’ mode as many of President Trump’s rivals such as the former Secretary of State John Kerry allegedly called on secretly to PA leaders to wait on the sidelines as all expect the U.S. midterm results to hurt Donald Trump.