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Greenblatt advances Trump’s Mideast peace plan in congressional meetings

Special Envoy for Middle East Affairs Jason Greenblatt thanked Democratic and Republican senators for recent discussions on the president’s forthcoming peace plan.

By: JNS.org

U.S. President Donald Trump’s Special Envoy for Middle East Affairs Jason Greenblatt has spoken with a number of senators on both sides of the political aisle recently about the president’s plan for peace between Israel and the Palestinians, Greenblatt tweeted on Friday.

Greenblatt said it had been well worth it for him and Trump adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner to meet with Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham, Bob Corker, James Lankford, James Risch, and Democratic Sens. Ben Cardin, Chris Coons, Jeanne Shaheen, Bob Menendez and Chris Van Hollen to “discuss the Trump administration’s peace efforts.”

Trump and his staff have spent many months working on what he has called the “deal of the century.” Palestinian reports in August said that the president would unveil it at his address to the U.N. General Assembly in September, but that did not come to pass.

The United States has, in the past, warned that if ‎Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas ‎remains adamant in his refusal to engage the United States as ‎a mediator in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, ‎Washington will introduce its regional peace plan ‎regardless of his reservations. ‎

Abbas has been shunning the U.S.’s peace efforts ‎since Trump’s Dec. 6 recognition of Jerusalem as ‎Israel’s capital and the subsequent move of the U.S. ‎Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and ‎has accused the Trump administration of being ‎‎“grossly biased” in Israel’s favor. ‎

In August, Greenblatt, Kushner, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman tweeted a joint statement that acknowledged that “no one will be fully pleased with our proposal, but that’s the way it must be if real peace is to be achieved. Peace can only succeed if it is based on realities,” the statement said.