The Palestinian Authority has sent messages to US President-elect Joe Biden informing him that the PA is willing to resume US-brokered peace talks with Israel from the point at which they broke off in 2016, a senior member of PA President Mahmoud Abbas's staff has told Israel Hayom.
Then-President Barack Obama, under whom Biden served as vice president, presented Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Abbas with a position paper in favor of continued talks between Israel and the Palestinians. But while Israel said that even though the plan reached by the Obama administration was not to Israel's benefit, it would agree to discuss the proposal, Abbas did not even reply to the president.
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The PA official also said that although Biden and his staff had made indications that the US Embassy in Israel would remain in Jerusalem and the US would keep President Donald Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in place, Abbas would ask Biden to revoke American recognition of Jerusalem's status and move the embassy back to Tel Aviv.
Prior to the end of the 2020 presidential election, Abbas advisor Nabil Shaat said that the Palestinians would see "Trump's defeat as a great success for us," and added that the Palestinians would ask Biden to reopen the PLO mission in Washington immediately.
The PA leadership was rejoicing on Saturday when the election was called for Biden. However, more and more senior PA officials are saying that while Biden's victory will help Abbas "out of the corner into which he backed himself" when he decided to boycott the Trump administration, the Palestinians would find it difficult to refuse Biden's request that they come back to the negotiating table.
Another senior advisor to Abbas told Israel Hayom that "Biden is known for his affection for Israel, and his pro-Zionist stances. He has said a number of times that he is a Zionist and has had friendly relations with Netanyahu for over 30 years."
According to this advisor, "Biden was also Obama's vice president when Abbas didn't bother to respond to the proposal that Obama sent to both sides to new negotiations before the end of his second term, and Biden was the one who tried to reconcile between the rais [president] and Obama, who was very offended when Abbas ignored him."
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He added: "We won't be able to turn Biden down easily, as we could Trump, and that could turn out to be a double-edged sword. Obama was the most pro-Palestinian president and it's hard for me to picture Biden adopting a similar policy in light of his declarations that he will not move the US Embassy back to Tel Aviv and not cancel the Trump administration's decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel."
Meanwhile, prior to the announcement of Biden's victory on Saturday, Abbas said he would announce that the PA would be restarting security cooperation with Israel and the US if he won, the London-based independent Arabic news site Elaph reported.
The PA announced in May that it was stopped security coordination and cooperation.
Elaph quoted a senior PA official, who said that Abbas was planning a major speech after the US election results were announced. The official said that Abbas planned to congratulate Biden and announce his willingness to resume work with the American administration immediately and go back to peace talks with Israel anchored in the two-state solution.
The report also said that Abbas planned to announce he would once again be accepting the tax money Israel collects on behalf of the PA, which he spurned after Israel deducted an amount equivalent to what the PA pays out to terrorists and their families. In August, given the dire economic situation in the PA, Abbas agreed to accept half the money Israel was holding.
