One glance at the logo of the Board of Peace tells you all you need to know. It is the globe and laurels of the UN – only gold, because this is Donald Trump’s initiative, and showing little of the world beyond North America.
The charter of the board, formally launched in Davos on Thursday, suggests that this is less America First than Trump Always. It is not “the US president” but Mr Trump himself who is named as chair, for as long as he wishes. He can pick his successor, decide the agenda and axe whomever he chooses – even if they have coughed up the $1bn demanded for permanent membership. It is the institutional expression of his belief that he is bound not by law but “my own morality, my own mind”.
The body was birthed in subterfuge: the UN security council authorised a board of peace chaired by Mr Trump to oversee administration and reconstruction in Gaza. Despite misgivings about the colonialist model and free rein given to the US president, the vagueness of the resolution and desire to ensure his buy-in to a ceasefire won its passage.
What the US has created is something entirely different. The board’s charter does not mention Gaza once. A man increasingly fixated on landgrabs now heads an “international peace-building body” to replace “failed” institutions. To what extent this is a serious attempt to encroach upon, if not supplant, the UN, versus a symbolic declaration of power and creation of another forum for polishing his ego, is unclear. Mr Trump appears to have overplayed his hand again. His claim that Vladimir Putin had joined (Mr Putin disagreed) made it easier for the UK and others to back away from an offer they were not supposed to refuse.
Benjamin Netanyahu, another leader indicted by the international criminal court, will sit alongside the likes of Belarus, Uzbekistan and Hungary. Eight Muslim-majority states, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey, have together agreed to join. But traditional US allies are conspicuously absent. It is unclear how others can make themselves heard on Gaza’s future if they rightly shun a deliberate attempt to undermine multilateral institutions. But they must. The already difficult, almost impossible task of winning peace in Gaza and justice for Palestinians has been further compromised. With an executive board – featuring Tony Blair and Mr Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner – and a Gaza executive board containing regional officials, Palestinians are relegated to a fourth-tier technocratic committee.
For 2 million Palestinians enduring a brutal winter amid the ruins and ongoing bombardment by the Israeli military, Thursday’s presentation of plans for the next 100 days by Palestinian and US officials at least suggests that the administration has not totally lost interest. Mr Kushner’s ambitious proposals will displease those on the Israeli right who want to displace Palestinians entirely. Increases in aid, the reopening of the Rafah crossing, repairs to essential infrastructure and the reconstruction of homes and hospitals are all desperately needed. But what will materialise and on what terms?
Mr Trump’s real-estate fixation and desire to be applauded as a peacemaker may be the best hope of keeping him engaged, and reducing Mr Netanyahu’s sway. But the rights of Palestinians are being treated as an irrelevant detail. That cannot stand. Mr Trump has contempt for international law; others must continue to defend it.
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