Dershowitz: Trump is anxious for an Israel-Palestinian peace deal
"He was not in any way suggesting, at least in his conversation with me, a one-state solution."
By JPOST.COM STAFFUpdated: MARCH 30, 2017 09:40Donald Trump speaks during a joint press conference with Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the East Room of the White House in Washington , DC on Feb. 15, 2017 with an Israeli flag in the background(photo credit: SAUL LOEB / AFP)
US President Donald Trump is "really anxious to have a peace agreement," said renowned legal scholar Prof. Alan Dershowitz.In an interview with Army Radio broadcast on Thursday morning, Dershowitz said he drew the information from a conversation with Trump at the president's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on March 18. He added that Trump "believes that [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud] Abbas is anxious to make a deal" as well."I pressed the president on that," Dershowitz emphasized. "I said 'Abbas has tried to persuade many Israeli presidents that he is anxious to make a deal. The time has come for him to sit down at the negotiating table and to offer some compromises that will make a deal possible."Trump on the two state solution for Israel and Palestinians during meet with Trump , Feb. 15, 2017 (credit: REUTERS)When asked in the interview whether or not he thinks Trump is set on a two-state solution, Dershowitz recalled telling Trump that if he wants to make a deal, "it's very important that Israel has confidence that the Trump administration will stand behind Israel ... he shook his head.""Clearly he was talking about a two-state solution," Dershowitz pointed out. "He was not in any way suggesting, at least in his conversation with me, a one-state solution."On February 15, Trump caused a stir when he said he was open to ideas beyond a two-state solution, the longstanding bedrock of Washington policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “I’m looking at two states and one state, and I like the one both parties like,” Trump said at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “I can live with either one.”