The announcement by Kushner of a financial injection to Palestine without a political framework is “naive and dangerous”, said the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network.
“Palestinians have the education, knowledge and skills to be the masters of their own development,” said Bishop George Browning, President of the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network.
“What is required is a political plan for self determination that in turn, will put in place the foundation for economic development, not a US business plan of economic bribery rewarding Israel’s illegal occupation. A fist full of dollars will never buy their political freedom, dignity, equality, or community,” Bishop Browning said.
Kushner is calling this an “opportunity of the Century”, however it is more a ‘Steal of the Century’ – rewarding Israel by consolidating the existing situation on the ground, and unilaterally discarding the international community’s long accepted requirements for a just solution.
While the political part of the US plan has not yet been formally released, indications are that it will include:
- Annexation of the illegal settlements in the West Bank by Israel and further loss of land for Palestinians
- No Palestinian capital in Jerusalem
- Palestinians left trapped in a network of small, disconnected parcels of land that we call “Bantustans”, denied their freedom to move and continuing to live under perpetual military occupation.
- The refugee right of return is off the table, so descendants of Palestinians dispossessed in 1948 will be permanently cut off from their homeland
- No independent, sovereign state with a right to determine their own lives as a people because “Palestinians cannot govern themselves”
It is understood that in return for a promised future paycheck, Palestinians must surrender their basic rights for freedom and self-determination. If they refuse, they will be starved of them by Israel and Trump anyway.
“Australia must only support solutions that have been negotiated with all parties and provide a fair deal for both Palestinians and Israelis – this plan does neither,” said Bishop Browning.
