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Trump Suggests Two-State Solution No Longer Viable, Bucking Longtime US Policy Position
Republican presidential candidate and former US President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, US, April 2, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Rebecca Cook
Former US President Donald Trump has suggested he no longer believes in a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a significant pivot away from what has largely been a consensus position on the conflict among US politicians for decades.
“There was a time when I thought two states could work. Now I think two states is going to be very, very tough,” Trump said in an interview with Time magazine that was published on Tuesday.
“I also think you have fewer people that liked the idea,” he added. “You had a lot of people that liked the idea four years ago. Today, you have far fewer people that like that idea.”
The reason, Trump claimed, is that Palestinian “children grow up and they’re taught to hate Jewish people at a level that nobody thought was possible.”
Palestinian textbooks in both Gaza and the West Bank have come under fire for teaching children in school to hate Israel while fostering antisemitism and support for terrorism.
Trump explained that the late Sheldon Adelson — a major donor to Republican and Israel-related causes — had made a similar argument to him in the past, but the former president did not always buy it.
“And I had a friend, a very good friend, Sheldon Adelson, who felt that it was impossible to make a deal because the level of hatred was so great. And I think it was much more so on one side than the other, but the level of hatred of Jewish people was so great, and taught from the time they were in kindergarten and before,” Trump said.
Asked if he felt that same way, Trump said, “I disagreed with it. But so far, he [Adelson] hasn’t been wrong.”
The Biden administration has been a stalwart supporter of the two-state solution. During his State of the Union address earlier this year, US President Joe Biden said, “As we look to the future, the only real solution is a two-state solution.”
“There is no other path that guarantees Israel’s security and democracy,” he argued. “There is no other path that guarantees Palestinians can live with peace and dignity. There is no other path that guarantees peace between Israel and all of its Arab neighbors, including Saudi Arabia.”
Similarly, a group of Senate Democrats sent a letter to Biden in March calling on him to “reignite US leadership on a diplomatic solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict” by releasing a “bold, public framework” for establishing and recognizing a “nonmilitarized Palestinian state” after the war against Hamas in Gaza is over.
On the other hand, Sam Markstein, the Republican Jewish Coalition’s national political director, told The Algemeiner that Trump “clearly agrees with us that it’s a terrible mistake for the Biden administration to be pushing Israel to accede to the establishment of a Palestinian state while there’s a war on and there’s no genuinely peace-minded Palestinian leaders to put in charge of such a state.”
The proportion of Israelis who support a two-state solution has declined from 61 percent in 2012 to only 25 percent in 2023, according to Gallup. Meanwhile, support among Palestinians last year declined to 24 percent, down from a high of 59 percent in 2012. Young Israelis and Palestinians are less likely to support a two-state solution than their older counterparts.
However, it remains unclear whether there is a credible alternative to the two-state solution as an end-game in the conflict that would not disenfranchise or displace either Israelis or Palestinians.
Trump’s latest comments add to growing uncertainty over how he may approach policy regarding Israel in a possible second term. Last month, he deflected when asked if he supported Israel “100 percent.” He also said Israel had to “finish up your war” against the Hamas terror group and “get on to peace, to get on to a normal life for Israel, and for everybody else.”
In the Time interview, Trump also argued that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “rightfully has been criticized for what took place on Oct. 7” and that he has not taken proper action to secure the release of the hostages.
Hamas launched the current war with its Oct. 7 invasion of southern Israel, where Palestinian terrorists massacred 1,200 people and kidnapped 253 others as hostages, taking them back to Gaza.
“You know, they talk about all of these hostages. I don’t believe these people are able or even wanting to take care of people as negotiations. I don’t — I think the hostages are going to be far fewer than people think, which is a very sad thing,” Trump said.
The post Trump Suggests Two-State Solution No Longer Viable, Bucking Longtime US Policy Position first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
The post Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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