Report: President Trump Asks Palestinian Leader Abbas For Meeting

United States President Donald Trump reportedly requested a meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas when the two attend the United Nations General Assembly gathering later this month in New York. Israel’s Hadashot news also reported that the Trump administration conveyed to Ramallah that it will delay the roll-out of its highly-anticipated peace proposal until after the November U.S. mid-term vote, and possibly not before the end of 2019 depending on when Israel holds its next general elections. This comes as U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman on Tuesday night hailed the White House’s approach to the peace process, affirming that Washington had successfully “slayed the sacred cow of the calcified thinking that has held back progress on the Palestinian front.” In this respect, the envoy was likely referring to President Trump’s decision to take Jerusalem off the negotiating table by recognizing the holy city as Israel’s capital and moving the U.S. Embassy there in May. Also, the U.S. this week announced a total cut-off in funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which is responsible for overseeing more than five million descendants of Palestinians displaced in the 1948 war. The move is being construed as a first step in a concerted American effort to resolve another of the conflict’s so-called final-status issues by negating, at least in part, the so-called “right of return” to Israel of Palestinian refugees. Friedman also justified the decision by suggesting that “more than $10 billion in [U.S.] humanitarian aid to Palestinians [since 1994]… has brought the region no closer to peace or stability, not even by a millimeter.” Last week, a former high-ranking Israeli military official contended to The Media Line that President Trump’s “deal of the century” had fallen apart due to overwhelming opposition from Arab leaders, and that his Middle East team has therefore been forced back to the peace process drawing board.