Nonetheless, whether or not the "deal of the century" is unveiled soon, the leaked document if true offers a plausible glimpse into the Trump administration's thinking.
Given that Trump's Middle East team appear to have begun implementing the plan over the past 18 months even without its publication from moving the US embassy to Jerusalem to the recognition of Israel's illegal annexation of the Syrian Golan Heights the leak helps to shed light on how a US-Israeli "resolution" of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is likely to unfold.
Annexing the West BankThe proposed Palestinian entity would be named "New Palestine" apparently taking a page out of the playbook of Tony Blair, a Britain's former prime minister who became the international community's Middle East envoy from 2007 to 2015.
Back in the 1990s, Blair filleted his own political party, Labour, of its socialist heritage and then rebranded the resulting corporation-friendly party, a pale shadow of its former self, as "New Labour".
The name "New Palestine" helpfully obscures the fact that this demilitarised entity would lack the features and powers normally associated with a state. According to the leak, New Palestine would exist on only a tiny fraction of historic Palestine.
All illegal settlements in the West Bank would be annexed to Israel satisfying a pledge Netanyahu made shortly before last month's general election. If the territory annexed includes most of Area C, the 62 per cent of the West Bank Israel was given temporary control over under the Oslo accords, and which the Israeli right urgently wants to annex, that would leave New Palestine nominally in charge of about 12 percent of historic Palestine.
Or put another way, the Trump administration appears to be ready to give its blessing to a Greater Israel comprising 88 per cent of the land stolen from Palestinians over the past seven decades.
But it is far worse than that. New Palestine would exist as a series of discrete cantons, or Bantustans, surrounded by a sea of Israeli settlements now to be declared part of Israel. The entity would be chopped and diced in a way that is true of no other state in the world.
New Palestine would have no army, just a lightly armed police force. It would be able to act only as a series of disconnected municipalities.
In fact, it is hard to imagine how "New Palestine" would fundamentally change the current, dismal reality for Palestinians. They would be able to move between these cantons only using lengthy detours, bypass roads and tunnels. Much like now.
Glorified municipalitiesThe only silver lining offered in the alleged document is a proposed bribe from the US, Europe, other developed states, though mostly financed by the oil-rich Gulf states, to salve their consciences for defrauding the Palestinians of their land and sovereignty.
These states will provide $30bn over five years to help New Palestine set up and run its glorified municipalities. If that sounds like a lot of money, remember it is $8bn less than the decade-long aid the US is currently giving Israel to buy arms and fighter jets.
What happens to New Palestine after that five-year period is unclear in the document. But given that the 12 per cent of historic Palestine awarded to the Palestinians is the region's most resource-poor territory stripped by Israel of water sources, economic coherence, and key exploitable resources like the West Bank's quarries it is hard not to see the entity sinking rather swimming after the initial influx of money dries up.
Even if the international community agrees to stump up more money, New Palestine would be entirely aid dependent in perpetuity.
The US and others would be able to turn on and off the spigot based on the Palestinians' "good behaviour" just as occurs now. Palestinians would live permanently in fear of the repercussions for criticising their prison warders.
In keeping with his vow to make Mexico pay for the wall to be built along the southern US border, Trump apparently wants the Palestinian entity to pay Israel to provide it with military security. In other words, much of that $30bn in aid to the Palestinians would probably end up in the Israeli military's pockets.
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