US Mideast 'Deal Of Century' Attempts To Dictate Palestinians' Path - Abbas Adviser

US President Donald Trump's "deal of the century," which seeks to resolve the long-standing conflict between Palestine and Israel, is Washington's attempt to impose its own will on the Palestinians, Nabil Shaath, an adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said on Thursday

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 21st February, 2019) US President Donald Trump's "deal of the century," which seeks to resolve the long-standing conflict between Palestine and Israel, is Washington's attempt to impose its own will on the Palestinians, Nabil Shaath, an adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said on Thursday.

Trump has stated on numerous occasions that his administration has been preparing a so-called deal of the century for Israeli-Palestinian settlement. However, Palestinians rejected Washington's involvement in the settlement process after Trump recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and moved the US embassy there despite UN recommendations to refrain from establishing diplomatic missions in the city until its legal status was settled.

"The building that previously hosted the US consulate in Jerusalem now hosts its embassy in Israel. The Palestinian representative office is closing down in New York. Besides, the United States suspended financial aid to Palestinians. This is apparently what this deal of the century, so often mentioned by the United States, is about. The deal of the century is an attempt to dictate Palestinian people what they should do, according to the opinion of the United States and Israel.

Palestinian people obviously cannot accept this," Shaath said at a roundtable discussion on the status of Jerusalem at the Rossiya Segodnya International Information Agency's press center.

Washington has recently taken a number of hostile steps toward Palestine. First, it announced in late August it would stop contributing to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees. The following month, the United States decided to close the Palestine Liberation Organization's office in Washington over Palestinian efforts to encourage the International Criminal Court to open a probe Israel's alleged war crimes as well as their alleged failure to support the US government's peace efforts.

Within the framework of the settlement process, the Palestinians have been demanding that the future borders between the two sovereign states run along lines that existed before the 1967 Six-Day War they have even said they are open to a possible exchange of territories. They hope to create their own state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, with a capital in East Jerusalem.

Israel has refused to return to the 1967 borders and share Jerusalem, declaring the city its eternal and indivisible capital.