US Official Urges Netanyahu To Keep Alive Chance Of Palestinian State

The United States has asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to keep alive the prospect of a Palestinian state as he considers West Bank annexation, a senior official said Thursday. Netanyahu’s government had set July 1 as the date when it could begin unilaterally annexing the 30 percent of the West Bank allocated to Israel in the “Peace to Prosperity” plan outlined in January by US President Donald Trump.

Trump’s plan also lays out the grounds for an independent Palestinian state, although it would be demilitarized and its capital would not be inside the contested holy city of Jerusalem.

David Schenker, the top US diplomat for the Middle East, said that Netanyahu was facing domestic pressure as some of his supporters “want annexation but aren’t particularly enamored of the vision for peace that calls for a Palestinian state as well.” “So we’re calling on the Israelis not to do anything that would preclude the implementation of the vision,” Schenker said at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. -Full Report

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