Trump Drops Push for Two-State Solution in Mideast
President and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hint at broader regional approach
“I believe that the issue of the settlements is not the core of the conflict, nor does it really drive the conflict,” the Israeli leader said. “I think it’s an issue that has to be resolved in the context of peace negotiations.”
.. Mr. Netanyahu has officially advocated a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since 2009, but in practice he has approved increased settlement construction that the U.S. has said imperils that approach. He is under pressure from members of his right-wing coalition government to abandon support for a Palestinian state.
.. The Trump administration is discussing with Arab allies forming a military alliance that would share intelligence with Israel to help counter Iran,
.. Mr. Trump said on Wednesday his distancing himself from the two-state approach gives the Israelis and Palestinians leeway to reach a deal.
.. “The alternatives to a two-state solution would mean that Israel would have to choose between its commitment to democracy and the solemn obligation to be a homeland for the Jewish people,” Mr. Engel said, an apparent reference to the challenge of integrating more than four million people in the Palestinian territories with Israel’s predominantly Jewish population of eight million
.. Democrats and Republicans have vowed in the past to move the embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, and a 1995 U.S. law requires the move. But since then, presidents from both parties have used a national-security waiver included in the law to avoid doing so.