Palestinians say US conference doomed without political plan

JERUSALEM (AP) - The Palestinian prime minister said Monday that any American peace plan that ignores the Palestinian people's political aspirations for an independent state is doomed to fail.

Mohammad Shtayyeh's comments immediately cast a cloud over the American-led Mideast peace conference expected to take place in late June in the tiny Gulf Arab state of Bahrain.

The White House announced Sunday it will unveil the first phase of its long-awaited Mideast peace plan at the conference, saying it will focus on economic benefits that could be reaped if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is resolved.

The plan envisions large-scale investment and infrastructure work, much of it funded by wealthy Arab countries, in the Palestinian territories.

But officials say the June 25-26 conference will not include the core political issues at the center of the conflict: final borders, the status of Jerusalem, the fate of Palestinian refugees or Israeli security demands.

"Any solution to the conflict in Palestine must be political ... and based on ending the occupation," Shtayyeh, the prime minister said at a Palestinian Cabinet meeting. "The current financial crisis is a result of a financial war waged against us and we will not succumb to blackmailing and extortion and will not trade our national rights for money."

In another setback, Bashar Masri, a major Palestinian industrialist with vast business holdings throughout the West Bank, said he had turned down an invitation to the conference.

"I will not participate in this conference, and none of the representatives of our companies will participate," he wrote on Facebook. "We reaffirm our clear position: We will not deal with any event outside the Palestinian national consensus."

The Palestinians, who severed ties with the U.S. over a year ago, have repeatedly expressed fears that the White House will try to buy them off with large sums of investment in exchange for freezing their demands for an independent state. They believe the U.S. is trying to rally support from other Arab countries to bully them into accepting a plan they see as unacceptable.

In a joint statement with Bahrain, the White House said the gathering will give government, civil and business leaders a chance to rally support for economic initiatives that could be possible with a peace agreement.

"The Palestinian people, along with all people in the Middle East, deserve a future with dignity and the opportunity to better their lives," President Donald Trump's senior adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, said in a statement Sunday.

"Economic progress can only be achieved with a solid economic vision and if the core political issues are resolved," Kushner said.

Kushner and Trump's Mideast envoy, Jason Greenblatt, have been leading efforts to draft the plan, but after more than two years of work, they have not released any details.

A senior administration official in Washington told reporters Sunday that invitations to the conference are being sent to individuals in the United States, Europe, the Gulf, the wider Arab world and "some" Palestinian business leaders.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity pending a formal announcement.

There were no details on who might attend, or whether the internationally backed Palestinian Authority in the West Bank was being invited. Israel's Finance Ministry said it had not been invited.

In the absence of direct talks with Palestinian leaders, U.S. officials often talk of engaging private Palestinians and "civil society" groups.

Trump's ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, has embraced a group led by West Bank settlers that is seeking to promote business ties with Palestinian partners. Avi Zimmerman, the head of the Judea and Samaria Chamber of Commerce, said he expected his group's programs to be presented.

Without a formal address on the Palestinian side, it is also unclear how any large-scale projects would be carried out. It also was not known how any projects would be carried out in the Gaza Strip. The U.S. and Israel consider Gaza's Hamas rulers to be a terrorist group and have no direct contacts with them.

The Palestinians seek the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza - territories captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war - for an independent state. Breaking from the policies of its predecessors, the Trump administration has refused to endorse a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians.

The Palestinians severed ties with the White House after Trump recognized contested Jerusalem as Israel's capital in December 2017 and subsequently moved the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. The U.S. has also cut hundreds of millions of dollars of aid for the Palestinians and closed the Palestinian diplomatic office in Washington.

The Palestinians have already said they would reject any peace plan offered by the U.S., saying Trump is unfairly biased toward Israel.

Kushner said it has been disheartening that the Palestinian leadership has attacked the plan before it's unveiled.

Earlier this month, Kushner insisted that the plan he's helped craft is a very detailed, fresh approach that he hopes will stimulate discussion and lead to a breakthrough in solving the decades-old conflict. At a think tank in Washington, Kushner described it as an "in-depth operational document" not anchored to previous, failed negotiations, high-level political concepts or stale arguments.

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Associated Press writers Isabel DeBre in Jerusalem, and Deb Riechmann, Matthew Lee and Calvin Woodward in Washington contributed to this report.