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The peace plan “will be a proposal very close to what the Israelis want. Is it doomed to fail? I should say 99 percent yes," said Outgoing French Ambassador to the U.S. Araud.
The peace plan for the Middle East by the U.S. President Donald Trump is “doomed to fail,” outgoing French Ambassador to the United States Gerard Araud said in an interview with The Atlantic magazine, adding that such a deal would make Israel "officially an apartheid state" which is already the case according to him.
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The peace plan “will be a proposal very close to what the Israelis want. Is it doomed to fail? I should say 99 percent yes, but 1 percent, you never forget the 1 percent,” said the retired Ambassador.
Araud, who is close to Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, the author of the peace plan said that the basis of the plan is imposing terms on the weaker party during negotiations.
“He is totally in real-estate mode. He is totally dry. He’s extremely smart, but he has no guts. He doesn’t know the history… he is so rational, and he is so pro-Israeli also, that he may neglect the point that if you offer the Palestinians the choice between surrendering and committing suicide, they may decide the latter. Somebody like Kushner doesn’t understand that,” said Araud.
Araud also believes that the negotiations are basically transactions for Trump.
“Once Trump told Macron, “I have given everything to the Israelis; the Israelis will have to give me something.” He is totally transactional,” the interview stated.
He further argued that the Middle East Peace Plan is dependent on Trump’s popularity in Israel, making Palestinians feel that the plan is the only way to gain limited sovereignty and giving money to Palestinians as a mean to stop their demands.
However, the problem with the plan is that “the status quo is extremely comfortable for Israel… They have the West Bank, but at the same time they don’t have to make the painful decision about the Palestinians, really making them really, totally stateless or making them citizens of Israel,” Araud explained.
“They won’t make them citizens of Israel. So they will have to make it official, which is we know the situation, which is an apartheid. There will be officially an apartheid state. They are in fact already.”
While U.S. officials have so far stayed tight-lipped on the details of the plan that has been in the works for over two years, The Washington Post reported last week that the deal will do away with Palestinian statehood. The Washington Post article contends that the Trump peace deal will focus primarily on Israel's security interests and less on Arab territorial concerns.
“We believe we have a plan that is fair, realistic and implementable that will enable people to live better lives,” a senior White House official said on Friday, as quoted by Israel's Arutz Sheva. “We looked at past efforts and solicited ideas from both sides and partners in the region with the recognition that what has been tried in the past has not worked. Thus, we have taken an unconventional approach founded on not hiding from reality, but instead speaking the truth.”
Meanwhile, France and other European countries have so far maintained their stance for a two-state resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict.
In light of the recent reports on Trump's highly anticipated peace plan, French President Emmanuel Macron said the need is to “decisively revive the Middle East peace process and to achieve a two-State solution, with Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace and security, in accordance with internationally agreed parameters.”
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