The United States reportedly has been engaged for several months in discussions with the Palestinian Authority, in an effort to repair ties with an eye to handing it control of the Gaza Strip and expanding the Abraham Accords.
The plan is contingent on the P.A. carrying out widespread reforms—reforms Saudi Arabia is heavily invested in moving along. A P.A. official told The Times of Israel that the Saudis view the reforms “as essential for establishing a pathway to the establishment of a Palestinian state.”
Washington backs the Saudi efforts as they harmonize with its broader goal of growing the circle of countries joining the Abraham Accords, the normalization agreements signed between Israel and several Muslim states. The Saudis have said they will only normalize relations with Israel if an “irreversible pathway” to Palestinian statehood is established.
The Trump administration’s 20-point plan, unveiled in September 2025, to end the Gaza war, also provides a path for “Palestinian self-determination and statehood” once reforms are “faithfully carried out.”
However, the P.A., despite repeated promises to reform, supports terrorism through its “pay-for-slay” program and glorifies violence against Israel and Jews in its official media and school curriculum. Its school books have been likened to those produced under the regime of Nazi Germany.
Maurice Hirsch, director of the Initiative for Palestinian Authority Accountability and Reform at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, told JNS that while he is concerned by the report, he found it difficult to believe that anyone in the Trump administration would look to the P.A. as a viable partner.
That said, U.S. President Donald Trump is eager to expand the Abraham Accords, Hirsch conceded, and he may be willing to signal his willingness to make a declaration to the effect that once reforms are in place he will recognize a Palestinian state.
It would be a repeat of the position he already set forward in his January 2020 “Deal of the Century” proposal.
A key question for Hirsch is to whom in the P.A. does the U.S. turn, given the unpopularity of the P.A.'s leadership among Palestinians. P.A. President Mahmoud Abbas, 90, became president in 2005 in an election boycotted by Hamas, meaning only half of eligible voters took part. And of those who did, less than half voted for him.
Or does the U.S. instead go to one of Abbas’s cronies, such as P.A. Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa, or Vice President Hussein al-Sheikh?
Promises to Macron
Reforms in the P.A. never materialize. It has been a year since Abbas sent a letter to French President Emmanuel Macron promising far-reaching reforms, Hirsch said.
They included a “curriculum that is free from incitement,” “the organization of presidential and general elections within a year to be conducted under international auspices” and “revoking the law on payments to families of prisoners and martyrs.”
The curriculum continues to incite to violence. IMPACT-se, a group that examines school texts for extremist content, found “recurring patterns across subjects: promotion of jihad and martyrdom, glorification of terrorism, incitement of antisemitism, rejection of peacemaking and the two-state solution, and erasure of Israel from maps.”
Abbas claimed just this week that presidential elections are to be held in November 2027, already a year later than the date promised to Macron. The P.A. has promised to hold elections, only to renege, many times. If elections do take place, it would be the first time since 2005.
Terror payments to prisoners and families continue, though the P.A. has made efforts to disguise the fact, as documented by Palestinian Media Watch. Abbas famously said on P.A. TV in July 2018, “By Allah, even if we have only a penny left it will only be spent on the families of the Martyrs and the prisoners, and only afterwards will it be spent on the rest of the people.”
The P.A. is putting on a “good performance” of implementing various reforms, though in reality it is doing nothing, Hirsch said. If it was serious about reform, there are easy changes it could make at once to show its good faith. Changing a curriculum may take time, but there’s nothing to stopping the P.A. from changing the names of its schools honoring terrorists.
Dozens of educational institutions are named after individuals involved in armed attacks on Israelis, including Dalal Mughrabi, who led the 1978 Coastal Road Massacre, in which terrorists seized a civilian bus, killing 35, including 13 children, and wounding 71; Khalil al-Wazir, aka Abu Jihad, who organized numerous attacks against Jews as commander of Fatah’s armed wing; and Salah Khalaf, who founded the Black September organization, responsible for the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre.
As to the report’s suggestion that the PLO diplomatic mission in Washington, D.C., which served as a de facto Palestinian embassy, would be reopened, Hirsch said it’s far-fetched.
It was ordered closed by the first Trump administration in 2018. “Even the Biden administration didn’t reopen the PLO’s offices,” he said. “That Trump is suddenly going to change his position and say the PLO is now actively engaged in a constructive manner to bring about peace, I don’t believe that that’s really going to happen.”
