Ramallah protesters urge Arabs to boycott Bahrain 'workshop'
By KHALED ABU TOAMEHPALESTINIAN AUTHORITY PRESIDENT Mahmoud Abbas, Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh (third left) and other members of the new government attend the swearing-in ceremony in Ramallah last month.(photo credit: MOHAMAD TOROKMAN/REUTERS)
The Palestinians have thwarted US President Donald Trump’s plan for peace in the Middle East and will also foil the US-led economic conference scheduled to take place in Manama, Bahrain on June 25, Nabil Abu Rudaineh, spokesman for the Palestinian Authority presidency, said on Saturday.His statement came as Palestinians in the West Bank launched protests against Trump’s peace plan and the Bahrain conference.Referring to the yet-to-be-announced peace plan, Abu Rudaineh said: “The American conspiracy has faltered and its direction has changed. That’s because of Palestinian rejection [of Trump’s plan] and President Mahmoud Abbas’s clear position on Jerusalem, the refugees and the national principles.”Abu Rudaineh claimed that the US administration’s peace plan has been reduced to a workshop in Bahrain. “This plan could become a document that contradicts international law and Arab legitimacy,” he said.Regarding the Bahrain conference, the PA official claimed that its true objective is “to avoid political negotiations on the basis of international legitimacy, and this will inevitably lead to a dead end.”The US administration and the international community, Abu Rudaineh added, should stop trying solutions that have already been tried and failed over the past seven decades.In Ramallah, dozens of Palestinians protested against Trump’s plan and the upcoming Bahrain conference. The protest was organized by several Palestinian factions as part of a campaign to foil the US peace plan. Organizers said that similar protests will take place in the West Bank and Gaza Strip during the next two weeks.At the Ramallah protest, Palestinians chanted slogans against the US, Israel and Arab states that agreed to attend the Bahrain conference despite Palestinian calls for boycotting the gathering.The protesters called on Arabs to stage protests in front of Bahrain embassies in their countries to demand the cancellation of the economic workshop.At least five Arab countries are expected to attend the Bahrain conference: Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco.
The protesters carried placards that read: “The Bahrain workshop is an act of treason against the Palestinian cause and people” and “Palestinian people are united against the Trump plan.”Wasel Abu Yusef, member of the PLO Executive Committee, said that the protest showed that Palestinians were united in rejecting the Trump’s plan, “which aims to eliminate the Palestinian cause.”Walid Assaf, head of the Palestinian Commission Against the Wall and Settlements, said the protest sends a message that the Palestinians are opposed to “economic peace because the solution lies in ending the occupation and establishing an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.”The protest, he added, also sends a message that the Palestinians are opposed to Arab normalization with Israel “before ending the occupation.”Palestinian political activist Mustafa Barghouti, head of the Palestinian National Initiative party, said the Bahrain conference was aimed at “promoting a false illusion called economic prosperity as an alternative to freedom and independence. Palestine is not for sale, and Jerusalem is not for sale.”Barghouti pledged that the Palestinians will continue their “struggle until the downfall of the Deal of the Century.” He urged all Arabs to boycott the Bahrain conference and said the Americans were seeking to use it to promote normalization between Israel and the Arab states “at the expense of the Palestinian cause.”
