Commenting on US President Trump’s Middle East peace plan – “the deal of the century” – the PA has referred to Trump as “Balfour the Second.” They have expressed the view that Trump with his plan is unrightfully giving “Palestine” to the Jews, as Palestinian Arabs claim former British Foreign Secretary Lord Arthur Balfour did when he stated in 1917 that Britain was in favor of “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.”
The cartoon shows Trump on one knee as if he were proposing marriage, offering Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu a bouquet of flowers dripping blood and containing the Dome of the Rock and a church in a representation of Jerusalem. Netanyahu is holding his hands together in excitement with a heart next to his head indicating his emotions. Netanyahu and Trump are wearing blindfolds with eye cutouts and dressed in prison uniforms – apparently referring to them as being thieves who have stolen "Palestine," and also possibly to the fact that they are both facing legal proceedings.
Text on cartoon: "One who has no ownership to one who has no right"
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 30, 2020]
The text is a phrase used by the PA in reference to Lord Balfour and his declaration, and echoes the PA's equation of Trump as "Balfour the Second."
That Trump is “Balfour the Second” was similarly expressed by a columnist for the official PA daily, who titled his op-ed "Trump's plan – new colonialism and a war crime." Writer Muwaffaq Matar, who is also a member of Fatah’s Revolutionary Council, stated that Trump and his administration’s behavior prior to the announcement of the plan is proof of “a new colonialist plan against the Arab homeland beginning with Jerusalem,” and that the deal is a blueprint for “war and aggression” in which the US “partners” with Israel against the Palestinian Arabs:
“Trump is aware of our determined rejection of his plan 'the deal of the century’, which was preceded by a declaration of moral and material terror campaigns, a political and financial siege, and decisions that are at the least a reflection of a new colonialist plan against the Arab homeland beginning with Jerusalem, the historical and natural capital of Palestine [refers to Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital]. It is also the second stage in the plan to establish the colonialist presence 100 years after the Balfour Promise [i.e., Declaration], which gave the Jews of Europe a homeland in Arab Palestine so that there would be a forward base for Britain in a region rich in resources and natural treasures, and in order to guarantee control over the strategic passages… The deal of the century is the written plan of Balfour the Second, Donald Trump, according to whose clauses the Trump administration will implement a war and aggression as a partner with the senior officials of the Israeli occupation state.”
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 26, 2020]
Palestinian Media Watch has documented that the PA has incessantly stressed its rejection of the plan even before it was publicized, that the PLO called for terror in protest of “the deal of the century,” and that Fatah has threatened anyone who supports it.