Sen. George Mitchell discusses negotiating peace in the Middle East and Trump’s foreign policy
As President-elect Donald Trump meets Tuesday with Sen. Bob Corker and former Gov. Mitt Romney as potential candidates to be secretary of state, one foreign policy issue that will likely come up is how the U.S. will try to negotiate peace in the Middle East.
Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell’s new book, “A Path to Peace,” tries to offer his own solution to Israeli and Palestinian relations. The former U.S. special envoy for Northern Ireland under President Clinton and U.S. special envoy for Middle East peace under President Obama believes that each side’s self-interests will ultimately lead to a two-state solution.
“Israel has a state, a very successful state, but their people live in fear and anxiety; Palestinians don’t have a state and they want one.” Mitchell told Yahoo News and Finance Anchor Bianna Golodryga. “The purpose of our book is to make the case for the two-state solution that although it hasn’t been achieved in spite of efforts over more than a half-century, it remains the most viable, credible option, and we hope it can be kept alive and pursued vigorously by the incoming administration.”
Mitchell “hope[s] and pray[s]” that Trump and his secretary of state will finally make lasting peace in the region. In addition to Romney and Corker, the president-elect appears to be considering former CIA Director and retired Gen. David Petraeus and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani for the role.
Mitchell declined to answer who would be best suited for the job, saying, “I don’t want to put the kiss of death on anyone.”
“It’s up to the president-elect to decide,” said Mitchell. “He’s got to find the right balance between compatibility with him personally, with his views, and the type of approach that would be most likely to succeed in dealing with [Israel-Palestine relations] and other issues.”
But he did weigh in on former President Jimmy Carter’s op-ed Tuesday suggesting that President Obama grant American diplomatic recognition to the state of Palestine. Mitchell remarked that while he has “great respect for former President Carter … his recommendation is premature.”
“To now make a declaration of that type would essentially reverse an American policy that has been in place for many, many decades,” said Mitchell. “It is significant that so many countries have recognized Palestine, but it is not determinative from our standpoint.”
Mitchell also addressed another Middle East conflict — the war against ISIS.
“We are going to defeat ISIS,” said Mitchell. “But the conditions that led to ISIS, which lead to al-Qaida before it, which led to al-Nusra and other groups, have to be dealt with as well, or there is just going to be another group with another name doing the same kinds of things.”
