Trump<\/a>, speaking after a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu<\/a> at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland said he aimed for peace in the Middle East.<\/p>\n Palestinians shunned Pence\u2019s visit <\/a>to the region this month after Trump recognised Jerusalem<\/a> as Israel\u2019s capital and vowed to begin moving the US embassy to the city, whose status is at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict<\/a>.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s endorsement in December of Israel\u2019s claim to Jerusalem as its capital drew universal condemnation from Arab leaders and criticism around the world<\/a>. It also broke with decades of US policy that the city\u2019s status must be decided in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen they disrespected us a week ago by not allowing our great vice president to see them, and we give them hundreds of millions of dollars in aid and support, tremendous numbers, numbers that nobody understands\u00a0that money is on the table and that money is not going to them unless they sit down and negotiate peace,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n Washington had already said it would withhold<\/a> about half the initial aid it planned to give a UN agency that serves the Palestinians.<\/p>\n A spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said the United States had taken itself \u201coff the table\u201d as a peace mediator since it recognised Jerusalem as Israel\u2019s capital.<\/p>\n \u201cPalestinian rights are not up to any bargain and Jerusalem is not for sale. The United States can\u2019t have any role unless it retreats its decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel\u2019s capital,\u201d spokesman Nabil Abu Rdainah told Reuters by phone from Jordan.<\/p>\n Abbas has called Trump\u2019s Jerusalem declaration a \u201cslap in the face\u201d and has rejected Washington as an honest broker in any future talks with Israel. Abbas left for an overseas visit before Pence arrived.<\/p>\n Israel\u2019s government regards Jerusalem as the eternal and indivisible capital of the country, although that is not recognized internationally. Palestinians see East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state.<\/p>\n Trump said Palestinians had to come to the negotiating table.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause I can tell you that Israel does want to make peace and they\u2019re going to have to want to make peace too or we\u2019re going to have nothing to do with them any longer,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n Trump said his administration had a peace proposal in the works that was a \u201cgreat proposal for Palestinians\u201d which covers \u201ca lot of the things that were over the years discussed or agreed on\u201d, without providing specifics.<\/p>\n Trump said that his declaration of Jerusalem as Israel\u2019s capital took it off the negotiating table \u201cand Israel will pay for that\u201d, adding \u201cthey\u2019ll do something that will be a very good thing\u201d without elaborating.<\/p>\n Earlier at the World Economic Forum, Jordanian King Abdullah<\/a> said Jerusalem had to be part of a comprehensive solution.<\/p>\n He said Trump\u2019s decision had created a backlash, frustrating Palestinians who felt there was no honest broker.<\/p>\n But he added: \u201cI\u2019d like to reserve judgment because we\u2019re still waiting for the Americans to come out with their plan.\u201d<\/p>\n King Abdullah\u2019s Hashemite dynasty is the custodian of the Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem, making Jordan particularly sensitive to any changes of status there.<\/p>\n At the United Nations on Thursday, the US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, also criticised the Palestinians, describing a recent speech by Abbas as indulging \u201cin outrageous and discredited conspiracy theories\u201d.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" http:\/\/www.france24.com\/en\/20180125-usa-israel-palestinians-jerusalem-trump-davos US President Donald Trump threatened on Thursday to withhold aid to the Palestinians if they did not pursue peace with Israel, saying they had snubbed the United States by not meeting Vice President Mike Pence during a recent visit. Trump, speaking after a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland said… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/57"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1328"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1329,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1328\/revisions\/1329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}