Palestinians soothe at growing contact with U.S. under Trump

The Palestinians expressed relief Sunday following the recent growing improvement in their contact with the new U.S. administration led by Trump since he took office in the White House on January 20.

During a phone conversation, Trump invited Abbas to visit the White House soon, an invitation the Palestinians considered as a turning point in the ties between U.S. and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA).

Last Friday, Trump had a conversation with President Mahmoud Abbas on the phone; the first such talk since Jan. 20.

The U.S. contacts with the Palestinians had reached its lowest levels politically, economically and in terms of security, according to chief negotiator Saeb Erekat.

In February, Palestinian intelligence security chief Majid Farraj coordinated a meeting between Abbas and CIA chief Mike Pompeo in Ramallah.

The meeting focused on the importance of pushing forward the stalled peace process in the Middle East.

Following the telephone conversation between Trump and Abbas, the latter held talks in Ramallah on Saturday night to coordinate the upcoming ties between U.S. and the Palestinians in the future.

Earlier, Erekat announced that Trump told Abbas he will delegate his envoy to the region next week to work on arranging a meeting between them in the future.

"U.S. envoy Jason Greenblatt will meet in Ramallah with President Abbas on Tuesday to discuss the arrangement of a meeting between President Trump and President Abbas in the White House soon," Erekat told Voice of Palestine Radio.

The veteran Palestinian negotiator said "the upcoming meeting in the White House is so important because it may lead to launching the stalled peace process again," adding "President Trump showed a U.S. commitment to the peace process."

Meanwhile, Reyad al-Malki, the Palestinian foreign affairs minister told the Palestinian radio "Trump's decision to send his convoy to meet with the Palestinians is a positive sign that expressed the U.S. concerns to end the Mideast conflict."

Al-Malki unveiled that the U.S. envoy may check the two sides; Israel and the Palestinians, desire to resume the stalled peace negotiations and finding a mechanism that enables the Palestinian side to keep in touch with the United States.

"I believe that the visit of Greenblatt to Ramallah and meeting with the Palestinian leaders would help to a great extent the U.S. administration to have a deeper understanding to the current situation in the Middle East."

Ahmed Awad, the Ramallah-based political analyst, told Xinhua that finally the U.S. administration found out that without being in contact with the Palestinians, the conflict in the Middle East won't be resolved, adding "improving the contacts with the Palestinian side would make peace in the Middle East imminent."

Source: Xinhua