US President Donald Trump said Monday that the long-awaited "deal of the century" on Middle East peace could be revealed before Israel's Knesset election next month.
Just last week, the president told reporters that the plan to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict likely won't be unveiled until after the Sept. 17 vote, but bits and pieces could be revealed beforehand.
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But speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the G-7 summit in France on Monday, Trump said that both Israelis and Palestinians were interested in reaching a peace deal and this could prompt him to move faster.
"We're going to know who the [Israeli] prime minister is going to be fairly soon," he said. "[A deal] won't be before the election, I don't think… But I think you may see what the deal is before the election. And I think the deal will happen… Everybody says, that's the deal that can't be made… Israel and the Palestinians: there's tremendous hatred for many, many decades, and everybody says that is a deal that can't be made. So we'll see if we can make it."
"I think the Palestinians will be happy to get US funding again and make a deal," Trump added, referring to his administration's decision to slash funding for Palestinian agencies in an apparent effort to pressure the government into negotiating.
President @realDonaldTrump: I think Israel and the Palestinians would like to make a deal — after so many years and decades, I think they are tired of fighting.
📰 https://t.co/xMwAOcBbDK pic.twitter.com/XbbT9mpOmw
— i24NEWS English (@i24NEWS_EN) August 26, 2019
While the economic component of the plan was laid out at a Bahrain conference in June, the political aspect was put on hold until after the summer due to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's inability to form a governing coalition, thus leading to an additional election on September 17.
Donald Trump's son-in-law and Senior Adviser to the President Jared Kushner and Special Representative for International Negotiations Jason Greenblatt have spearheaded the administration's peace initiative and have let little slip about what the plan entails.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority has been steadfast in their vows to reject any negotiation presented by the US after Trump's unilateral decision to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, naming it as Israel's undivided capital.
In turn, the Palestinians say they no longer view Washington as an unbiased peace broker and boycotted the Bahrain "Peace to Prosperity" summit.
This article was originally published by i24NEWS.
