Recent regional developments and especially the normalization of ties between Israel and Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates make the beginning of the end, US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman told Israel Hayom on Wednesday aboard the Israeli delegation's return flight from Washington. The ambassador has spent the past month in the US.
Similar to US President Donald Trump's other advisers, Friedman, too, invested countless hours in ensuring the success of the Abraham Accords peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, respectively.
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Asked whether the Israeli-Arab conflict was over, the US ambassador said the end of the conflict was approaching, because many more countries would soon join. "We broke the ice and made peace with two important countries in the region," he said. And as promised by Trump, additional diplomatic breakthroughs are sure to follow, said Friedman. "When the dust settles, within months or a year," the Israeli-Arab conflict will be over," he said.
As for the impact of the developments on the Palestinians, Friedman said the Palestinian people are not being served properly by their leadership.
"I believe the people in Judea and Samaria want a better life," he said, adding that the Palestinian people need to understand it's possible for them to attain such a goal. Their leadership, however, is still clutching to very old and irrelevant complaints, Friedman added. "They need to join the 21st Century. They are on the wrong side of history at the moment."
It has been speculated that former Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan, a bitter political rival of PA President Mahmoud Abbas who became an adviser to UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, could be supported by the US to unseat Abbas.
Asked whether the US is considering the possibility of appointing Dahlan, who lives in the UAE, as the next Palestinian leader, Friedman replied: "We're not thinking about it," we have no desire to engineer the Palestinian leadership.
On the matter of Israel's now-paused sovereignty initiative in parts of Judea and Samaria, Friedman said, "I think it will happen." He noted obstacles posed by the coronavirus pandemic and difficulties from a diplomatic perspective, and that then the opportunity with the UAE arose. The conclusion reached by the Americans, said Freidman, was that even though sovereignty was deemed the correct move, Israeli flags are still raised above Jewish settlements across Judea and Samaria and that "according to our vision for peace they will continue" to be raised there. Therefore, he said, even if sovereignty is a good thing, peace takes precedence.
"Peace is a once-in-a-generation opportunity," said the ambassador. After pushing the peace initiative forward and fully capitalizing on it, Friedman said he believes the sovereignty issue can be revisited in a manner that will be less controversial. "It's a temporary suspension," he said of the sovereignty process, also noting that the current administration was the first to stipulate the legality of the settlements according to international law and the only administration to unveil a peace plan that rejects the removal of Jews from their homes in Judea and Samaria.
Asked what he would like to tell the citizens of Israel on the eve of the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah, Friedman wished for the pandemic to pass quickly for all of humanity's sake, and that "we all have a good and sweet year."
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