Post #4932

Trump’s World Had Become Safer... What About Ours? Trump has claimed the world is “richer, safer and much more peaceful than it was just one year ago” as he hosted a launch event for his “board of peace” initiative at the World Economic Forum in Davos. At a signing ceremony for the new organisation, the US president said it would be “one of the most consequential bodies ever created in the history of the world”. US and Palestinian officials also used the ceremony to lay out a blueprint for the next steps in implementing a ceasefire in Gaza, and putting the territory under the day-to-day control of a Palestinian-run technocratic administration, which has been assembled in Cairo. The president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner outlined a plan for the next 100 days, including a significant increase in aid deliveries, the rehabilitation of essential infrastructure, such as water, electricity and sewage systems, and the reconstruction of hospitals and bakeries. Kushner also presented an aspirational map of a future Gaza in which the territory had a buffer zone around the border with Israel but was unified, rather than partitioned as it is now. In the most dramatic moment of the ceremony, Ali Shaath, the Palestinian official chosen to run an interim administration in Gaza, appeared by video link to announce that the Rafah crossing from Gaza to Egypt would be reopened next week for traffic in both directions for the first time since May 2024. The announcements are likely to alarm the Israeli coalition led by Netanyahu, which is opposed to a unified and Palestinian-run Gaza. Some ministers support the building of Israeli settlements on occupied territory, and several are opposed to the reopening of Rafah before the body of the Israeli hostage Ran Gvili, the last to be accounted for, is handed over by Hamas. The Israeli cabinet was due to convene on Thursday to discuss Rafah and the other developments announced in Davos. Trump himself focused on his past achievements and repeated his disputed claim to have stopped eight wars. “We put out all those fires. Most people didn’t know, including me, that some of those wars were going on,” he said. Trump was joined at a table on the stage to sign a document inaugurating the body by the Moroccan foreign minister, Nasser Bourita, and Sheikh Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa of Bahrain. Other leaders then approached to sign in pairs, their names read out by Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt. Some diplomats had warned that Trump might hope the organisation would supplant the United Nations, but the US president claimed the two could work together. Trump claimed the war in Gaza had been reduced to “little fires”. He said Hamas would “have to give up their weapons” and claimed that its members were “born with rifles in their hands”. Earlier on Thursday, the British foreign secretary, Yvette Cooper, said the UK would not be signing up to the “board of peace” for the moment. “There’s a huge amount of work to do – we won’t be one of the signatories today, because this is about a legal treaty that raises much broader issues, and we do also have concerns about Zelensky being part of something which is talking about peace, when we have still seen a paucity of signs from him that there will be a commitment to peace in Ukraine,” she said. #trump#zelensky#peace#davos#gaza#hamas#ukraine 📱American Оbserver - Stay up to date on all important events 🇺🇸