JERUSALEM - Secretary of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Saeb Erekat, said the threat of US President Donald Trump was a futile act. Trump had previously threatened the Palestinians that they would lose hundreds of millions of dollars in aid from Washington if they refused to negotiate peace with Israel.
"Trump can buy many things with his money, but he will not be able to buy the dignity of our nation," said Erekat as quoted from Russia Today, Friday (26/1/2018). Erekat insists that peace with Israel is impossible if Jerusalem's status is not on the agenda. This assertion rejects Trump's claim that the United States has removed the controversial issue from the negotiating table. "Jerusalem is not outside the negotiating table, but the United States is outside the international consensus, those who say Jerusalem is not on the table of peace talks say peace is not counted," Erekat said.
"The holy city is in the hearts of every Palestinian, Arab, Christian and Muslim, and there will be no peace without East Jerusalem becoming the capital of a Palestinian state," he asserted. Earlier in a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump said that the United States would remove the issue of Jerusalem from the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiation agenda. "We took Jerusalem out of the table, so we do not have to talk about it anymore," he told Netanyahu during a meeting at the World Economic Forum in Davos. However, the US leader rejected a question from an Israeli journalist, who wanted to know whether the phrase "outside the table" meant that no part of Jerusalem would become the capital of a sovereign Palestinian state in the future. Trump then warned that the US would stop financial aid unless the Palestinians were willing to sit down and negotiate peace. The recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel by the United States resulted in violent clashes for weeks in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza. As a result fell a number of casualties and more than 1,000 Palestinians were injured. Thousands of people took to the streets to protest and burn US flags in Jordan, Iran, Egypt, Indonesia and elsewhere throughout the Muslim world. In response to Trump's decision, many Muslim countries also recognize East Jerusalem as
