The former UK prime minister Tony Blair appears to have won the endorsement of the Palestinian Authority to be involved in the reconstruction of Gaza, after an exploratory meeting in Jordan.
Blair met Hussein al-Sheikh, the deputy president of the Palestinian Authority (PA) and head of the Palestine Liberation Organisation executive committee, in Amman, Jordan, on Sunday. It was the first such meeting since Donald Trump announced Blair’s role in his 20-point plan.
Although Blair was present in New York for key meetings with Arab leaders at the UN general assembly, this is the first attempt to test the water about his possible role with the Palestinian leadership. Hamas, which has said it will not have a future role in the government of Gaza, has opposed Blair’s involvement and the idea that any board should act as foreign guardian for Palestine.
The precise powers of the US president’s proposed “board of peace” and its relationship to a technocratic committee of appointed Palestinians has yet to be clarified.
In a statement, al-Sheikh said: “Today, I met Mr Tony Blair to discuss the day after the war and making President Trump’s efforts, which aim at stopping the war and establishing lasting peace in the region, a success. We have confirmed our readiness to work with President Trump, Mr Blair and the partners to consolidate the ceasefire, the entry of aid, the release of hostages and prisoners, and then start with the recovery and reconstruction.”
He continued: “We stressed the importance of stopping the undermining of the PA, and especially the return of withheld Palestinian revenues, and preventing the undermining of the two-state solution in preparation for a comprehensive and lasting peace in accordance with international legitimacy.”
The PA is keen that tax revenues withheld by the Israeli government are released, since this is preventing salary payments and undermining its liquidity, in violation of the Oslo accords.
Israel has also threatened not to renew next month the annual waiver of terrorist financing laws, which allows Israeli banks to process transactions with Palestinian banks.
Sharhabeel al-Zaeem, the PA’s justice minister, last week criticised Blair’s involvement, saying: “Is this the independent Palestinian state we are aiming for? All these struggles for all these years in order to have Mr Blair, who failed in London, who failed in Britain, who failed in Iraq, come and – with all due respect at a personal level to Mr Blair – be our guardian as if we were minors?”
Blair will have to negotiate a fine line since neither the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, nor the Trump administration have yet said they are willing to work with the PA. Trump banned the PA president, Mahmoud Abbas, from flying to the UN, although reports on Sunday suggested Abbas would attend Monday’s summit in Egypt.
The Trump plan did not specify when power would be transferred to a reformed PA, but at a minimum the PA would have to hold elections and show it was capable of overseeing the vast reconstruction effort. Blair has reassured the PA that its involvement is a sign Gaza and the West Bank will eventually be governed as one entity.
French diplomats said they were also starting to work on a possible UN security council mandate for the planned international stabilisation force
Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, with whom Blair has a close relationship, has frequently insulted Abbas, describing him as a leader of refugee group.
