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Trump Mideast Peace Push to Start Without Israel, Palestine

Israel, Palestinian Authority Won't Attend Bahrain Peace Meeting

(Bloomberg) -- Israeli officials won’t take part in a U.S.-led economic summit in Bahrain this month, an event seen as a first step in the Middle East peace plan being developed by the White House.

The decision against going to Bahrain was made in coordination between Israel and the U.S., an official in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said.

The session, set for June 25-26, is meant to present an economic vision to the Palestinian people, and the U.S. doesn’t want politics to overshadow economics, an American administration official said. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

Israel’s decision not to send government officials was reported earlier Monday by Axios. On Tuesday, Netanyahu said some Israelis would be going to Bahrain, and Israeli media reported they would include a former general who coordinated civilian issues with the Palestinians during his army service and speaks fluent Arabic.

The U.S. peace plan is being led by Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser. In comments earlier this month, Kushner said the hope was that Palestinians “over time will become capable of governing.”

The effort to engineer an economic aid plan is the less controversial part of the package: Release of Kushner’s political proposal for the Israel-Palestinian conflict has been repeatedly delayed and now isn’t expected until sometime after Israel elections in September.

Kushner has criticized Palestinian leaders, drawing a distinction between their efforts toward an independent state and what he said was the Palestinian people’s desire to live in peace and prosperity. He has made repeated trips to the Middle East to meet with Israeli and Arab leaders, but the Palestinian leadership has shunned all contact with the U.S. administration since Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital 18 months ago.

The Palestinian Authority is boycotting the session in Bahrain, and Palestinian business organizations have declined a U.S. invitation to attend.

In addition to the Jerusalem move, Trump has wavered on the U.S. commitment to Palestinian statehood, closed the Palestine Liberation Organization’s diplomatic mission in Washington and halted hundreds of millions of dollars of funding to the Palestinians.

--With assistance from Alyza Sebenius.

To contact the reporters on this story: Ivan Levingston in Tel Aviv at ilevingston@bloomberg.net;Josh Wingrove in Washington at jwingrove4@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Michael Shepard at mshepard7@bloomberg.net, Larry Liebert, Michael S. Arnold

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