The invitation extended by US President Donald Trump to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas took Israel by complete surprise. It was made March 10 during a phone call in the evening hours at Trump's initiative. According to a Palestinian source who spoke with Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, Trump was courteous and attentive, sounding out Abbas on how he views the future of talks with Israel and whether he thinks an agreement can be reached. Abbas answered in the affirmative, and the two arranged to meet in the Oval Office, according to the source.
When the Palestinian president put down the phone at the end of the call, “Team Trump” breathed a sigh of relief. If all goes as planned and the meeting takes place in May, the tempestuous president will get to know Abbas personally and, to the extent possible, see through the diabolical image of him that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has painted over the years.
That does not mean that Abbas’ associates are sanguine. The attitude toward the new president is, as President Ronald Reagan said of the Soviets, “trust but verify.” But the restrained and calculated diplomacy (and some Palestinians would proudly add “clever”) adopted by the Palestinian Authority (PA) has yielded impressive results far beyond expectations. For example, Trump has already laid down the law to Netanyahu on Israeli settlements in the West Bank (asking Netanyahu not to build any new settlements), all thanks to the backstage diplomacy conducted by the Palestinians.
As reported first by Al-Monitor, the initiative to invite the Palestinian president to the White House was hatched in February at a meeting in PA headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah between Abbas and CIA Director Mike Pompeo. A solid personal relationship forged with Majid Faraj, the head of the Palestinian Security Services, was a contributing factor. The Pompeo-Abbas meeting was held at the same time as Trump and Netanyahu were sitting down to talk at the White House. The Palestinians understood that they must get Trump and Abbas together as soon as possible before the US president has time to formulate a misguided policy based on what he has heard from Netanyahu and from pro-Israel Trump administration figures.
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