Hardly anyone saw it coming. Late Tuesday evening, 8 November, the US presidential elections were about to end and the whole world, without exaggeration, was in for a very big surprise. The winner was about to say a few remarks and the defeated candidate was expected to deliver a customary concession speech. Twenty-four hours earlier, the question had been whether Donald Trump would be willing to concede his losing the election to Hillary Clinton. The big surprise was in the reversal of roles. Trump won 289 electoral votes, beyond the 270 votes needed to win the elections. After Mrs Clinton graciously congratulated Donald Trump on his election victory, he praised her and her contribution and efforts in the service of the United States, saying Clinton, “has worked very long and very hard over a long period of time, and we owe her a major debt of gratitude for her service to our country”. Trump added: “Now it is time for America to bind the wounds of division. We have to get together. To all Republicans, Democrats and independents across this nation, I say it is time for us to come together as one united people.” He continued: “While we will always put America's interests first, we will deal fairly with everyone. We will seek common ground, not hostility.” It was a very civilised denouement of a presidential campaign unprecedented in nastiness. The election results mean that the Barack Obama era is drawing to a close, not only in terms of domestic politics within the United States, but also with regards to American foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East. The transition has already begun in Washington DC. President Obama invited President-elect Donald Trump to the White House where they had a 90-minute meeting Thursday, 10 November, while Vice President Joe Biden invited Vice President-elect Mike Pence to dinner. It was decided that Pence would preside over Trump's transition team. It was a wise decision given the fact that he has strong contacts in Washington DC from his six terms in the US Congress. The victory of Trump at the polls raised questions around the world concerning what changes the new US administration will bring to US foreign relations. Will it be a complete break with the policies followed in the last eight years of the Obama administration, especially with regards to American-Russian relations, and what this would mean for other powers around the globe? Will Trump warm up to Russian President Vladimir Putin to the extent that the legacy of Obama — legacy of soft containment that has failed to pressure Russia while constraining the United States in finding solutions to intractable crises, like that in Syria — will be behind us? During the presidential campaign, Trump left no doubt that he had nothing against working with Putin's Russia in order to fight terrorism and to try to find a way out of the Syrian quagmire. That's the reason why President Putin said Wednesday, 9 November, that “we heard the campaign statements of the future president about the restoration of relations between Russia and the United States. It is not an easy path, but we are ready to do our part and do everything to return Russian-American relations to a stable path of development. This will be good for both the Russian and American people and have a positive impact on the climate of world affairs.” On the same day, the spokesman for the Kremlin said that Russia hopes coordination with the United States over the war in Syria “… would improve under the new US president”. One of the biggest question marks over the new directions the Trump administration will take in foreign policy is, undoubtedly, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Obama tried in his first term to push for the implementation of the two-state solution — Palestine and Israel side by side in recognised and secured borders. He could not deliver. President Obama will leave office with American-Israeli relations stronger than ever while the peace process is in the doldrums. With a campaign promise to move the US embassy to Jerusalem, we should wonder how could the new administration give fresh impetus to the moribund peace process? One close adviser in the Trump camp told The Jerusalem Post on 9 November that one of the administration's first moves would be to move the US embassy. He said: “It was a campaign promise and there is every intention to keep it.” What was reassuring on this score was what Mark Toner, the State Department spokesperson, said last week on this grave question. “Since Israel's founding, the administrations of both parties have maintained a consistent policy here, and that is recognising no state as having sovereignty over Jerusalem.” He added that the Obama administration would make sure “the new administration would understand our rationale behind exercising that waiver”, referring to a waiver power given to the executive in the congressional Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995, which had mandated that the move to Jerusalem be done by 31 May 1999. Mr Toner made clear that making such a transfer would run counter to the national interests of the United States. But the new Republican administration will be subject to tremendous pressures to carry out the act, as well as the campaign promise made by Trump during the presidential campaign. However, it should not be ruled out that the United States procrastinates on this point. Maybe it will try to forge a lever from this issue, to put pressure on the Israeli government to make concessions to the Palestinian Authority and agree to begin taking credible steps on the resumption of peace talks with the Palestinians. It remains to be seen. One thing is for sure: Trump enjoys warm relations with Israel. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, told his cabinet Sunday, 13 November, that he had a phone conversation with Trump 9 November, the day after winning the presidential elections, and he invited the Israeli prime minister to visit Washington DC to meet him. Netanyahu that Trump “spoke of his deep friendship for Israel that has characterised him and the team around him for many years”. In the same cabinet meeting, Netanyahu asked his ministers and Israeli parliamentarians to wait till for the new US administration to be installed before talking either about the future of American-Israeli relations or the peace process in the Middle East. In my view, Arabs and Palestinians must begin contacting the transition team of President -elect Trump forthwith, and not leave the scene to the Israelis exclusively. On Friday, 11 November, The Wall Street Journal quoted Trump in interview as saying he hopes to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict after taking office. The new president-elect said this would be the “ultimate deal”. He went on to say: “As a deal maker, I would like to do … the deal that can't be made. And to do it for humanity's sake.” The least we could say, by way of commenting on this statement, is that we are before a man with a business mentality and a very rewarding business experience, and maybe such a mentality, based on a win-win equation, could resuscitate the peace process between the Palestinians and the Israelis, and push the two sides to a historic compromise. Two questions remain in this regard. The first is whether the new US president, once swore in 20 January, would be strong enough, politically, to face Netanyahu who is not interested in the two-state solution. The second question relates to the parameters of this hoped-for deal. Of course, we should distinguish between a “deal” and a “historic compromise”. The former would be dictated by the powerful and those who have strong cards to play at the negotiating table. In this case, the Israelis and the Americans. If it is the latter, then, the contours of the peaceful settlement of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict are enshrined in what is known as “international legality” — namely, Security Council resolutions and those of the General Assembly of the United Nations. One thing to monitor in the days ahead is whether the coming administration keeps faith and trust in the International Quartet. If yes, then we should be cautiously optimistic on its credible commitment to reviving peace talks between the Palestinians and the Israelis, deadlocked from April 2014. If not, then it is an “encore” of the status quo, unfortunately. Let us be cautiously optimistic. New realities are about to dawn on the Middle East with a host of challenges facing the Arabs and the Palestinians. I hope they will marshal their resolve and a collective political will to engage effectively with the new Republican administration in Washington. A Republican president, a Republican Senate and a Republican House of Representatives. It is an opportunity that should not be wasted to advance the Arab and Palestinian agendas. The writer is former assistant to the foreign minister.
