Top news stories from Israel/Palestine: May 1, 2019

What We’re Reading

Trump peace plan

Saudi Arabia offered Abbas $10 billion to accept Trump’s peace plan - report,

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has offered Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas $10 billion if he accepts US President Donald Trump’s plan for peace in the Middle East, also known as the “deal of the century,” the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar reported on Tuesday.

As Trump team prepares Mideast plan, Palestinians face financial crisis,

Israel and the United States are putting the financial squeeze on the Palestinian Authority, where opposition to a long-awaited U.S. peace plan and anger over Israeli sanctions remain strong.

Top Senators Warn: Trump's Peace Plan Could Destabilize Jordan,

Senators Mitt Romney and Chris Murphy warn that in Jordan, where the majority of the population is of Palestinian origin, ‘the reaction on the street to a peace framework that is not true’ could be serious.

Occupation/Human rights

Stone Men by Andrew Ross review – the Palestinians who built Israel,

A secret no one likes to talk about: how the West Bank settlements are built by Palestinians forced off the land.

PA court sentences Palestinian to prison for trying to sell land to Israeli Jews,

A Palestinian Authority court that convened in Nablus on Wednesday sentenced a Palestinian to five years in prison for attempting to sell land to Israeli Jews.

Israeli Who Sought Evacuation of Contested West Bank Village Builds Illegal Outpost Nearby,

An Israeli who has active in efforts to evict the residents of the contested Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar is setting up an a Jewish outpost without authorization just a few hundred meters from where the West Bank community.

Palestinian politics

Can Palestinians free themselves of the shekel?,

On April 13, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh made his first appearance on Palestine TV after taking office and pledged to seek alternative currencies for the Israeli shekel, putting his government to the test.

FMEP Podcast

The Peace Process is Dead. Here’s What Comes Next,

Khaled Elgindy joins the FMEP staff – Lara, Kristin, and Phil – to talk about what comes after the utter collapse of the U.S.-led peace process. This episode references a recent Foreign Policy article by Khaled and Lara, “The End of Oslo is an Opportunity.”