NABLUS, West Bank (CI Ukraine) – President Donald J. Trump could be the most beloved leader in Middle East history since Moses for his ‘business first” 20-point peace deal in Sharm El Shiek, effectively ending the Gaza war and creating a road map to create a Middle East economic zone capable of rivalling the European Union and the US-Canada Mexico free trade area.

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[Israel’s Democrats party leader, and likely successor to Bibi Netanyahu, Yair Golan speaks to Capitol Intelligence/CI Ukraine using CI Glass saying that it is much too soon to speak about the day after to rebuild the region, including Gaza, Lebanon and Syria and that Qatar must be excluded from participating in the rebuilding process as envisioned in President Trump’s 20 point peace plan]

The economic framework proposed in Trump’s initiative aims to foster collaboration, growth, and prosperity throughout the region by involving the region’s leading business leaders such as Egypt’s construction and telecommunications tycoons Nassef and Naguib Sawaris and Palestinian billionaires Minub and Bashar Masri.

The day after the Sharm El Sheikh accords, this reporter traveled through various locations including Tel Aviv; the Arab-majority Israeli cities of Nazareth and Umm El-Fahem; Aqaba, Jordan on the Red Sea; Jerusalem; and Nablus, the financial center of the West Bank. Across these cities, people universally praised President Trump.

[Beit Felasteen, the home of Minub Masri filmed by Capitol Intelligence/CI MENA using CI Glass in Nablus, West Bank modelled after Veneto architect Andrea Palladio’s Villa Rotonda in Vicenza of which inspired Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello and Unversity of Virginia’s Charlottesville Andrea Palladio Villa Rotonda in Vicenza of which inspired Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello and Unversity of Virginia’s Charlottesville]

In Jerusalem, posters praised Trump by likening him to King Cyrus, while Palestinians acknowledged his role in prompting Netanyahu to agree to a Gaza ceasefire.

Although Yair Golan, the leader of the Democrats party and a hero of October 7, is poised to succeed Netanyahu as Israeli Prime Minister, he remains cautious about the prospects for a new era of peace in the region while there is a feeling of unprecedent new hope among the people of the Holy Land.

The godfather of the Abrahamic accords, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, seemed to have created a miracle but not only ending the two-year internecine Gaza war over night but by doubling the members of Abrahamic accords. The twenty point peace plan effectively added Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Kuwait, Oman and Palestine to Abrahamic accords original members of Israel, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan.

The survival of the Abraham Accords—initiated by Jared Kushner and Los Angeles media mogul Haim Saban—even after October 7 and amid foreign-sponsored, pro-Palestinian demonstrations reportedly funded by Qatar, Russia, and China, demonstrated the accords’ political resilience. However, it also evidenced their economic shortcomings.

The events of October 7 have fundamentally changed the notion, previously maintained by Netanyahu, that Israel could serve as the primary economic powerhouse of the Middle East while excluding Palestinian participation.

This approach, which sidelined the input and involvement of Palestinians, lead to inevitable failure of most cross-border investments between Israel and gulf states of UAE and Bahrain. Nisreen Mansour an Israeli Arab US educated (Indiana University) M&A lawyer based in Nazareth and who leads Abrahamic accords investments through her Arab Society group, said the actual deal flows from the accords averaged out at circa $70m and most deal talks flopped for lack of deal flow infrastructure.

[Umm El-Fahem Art Gallery founder and artist Said Abu Shakra speaks to Capitol Intelligence/CI MENA using CI Glass with Projects Director Netali Brener on the unique character of Israel’s only Arab art gallery and mentoring Umm El-Fahed artists as Maria Saleh Mahameed and Hanna Abu Hussein currently exhibiting at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art.] ‪

President Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, recognize that economic interdependence is essential for the success of the new Abrahamic accords, paving the way for the Middle East free trade area once envisioned during the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s.

Kushner has taken the first steps to establish the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation as the ultimate clearinghouse and governing authority for all investments for the estimated $30 to $50 billion to rebuild Gaza and subsequent hundreds of billions to rebuild Lebanon and Syria.

The DFC, established by President Trump to replace OPIC and US AID, aims to leverage US and allied private sector resources to enhance national security through sustainable economic development.

The US Senate just confirmed NYC hedge fund manager Ben Black as the new CEO of DFC. Black is also the son of Leon Black, founder of one of private equity giant Apollo Global Management, Inc., now run by Marc Rowan. Rowan is reportedly being considered to become a board member of the Trump’s Gaza Board of Peace along with Tony Blair and Naguib Sawaris.

DFC provides project finance, equity investment, political risk insurance and is the only multi-lateral development finance institution that can self-insure war risk insurance.

One of the gatekeepers between the Gulf billions and DFC will be Palestinian real estate developer Bashar Masri who served as advisory board member to the DFC in the first Trump administration and is highly respected by top business leaders in Israel, the gulf and the G-7.

Bashar Masri is less well known than his prominent uncle, Munib Masri, who developed the Ayla resort in Aqaba in collaboration with Hyatt owner Thomas Pritzker and featured a championship golf course designed by Greg Norman. Greg Norman is a close friend and business partner to President Trump, with the two gentlemen participating in the Saudi backed professional LIV Golf tour.

Munib Masri also built a replica of the Villa Rotonda of Andea Palladio, the famed Veneto architect that inspired President Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello residence and The Rotunda at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville on a hilltop overlooking Nablus and the holy mountain of the ancient Samaritans, Mount Gerizim.

In an interview in their offices in Be’er Sheva, ISA Khoury Metal Industry Operations Manager Wadia Khoury said the group already built a 140-megawatt power plant and a desalination plant in Gaza funded in the past by the US government.

The plant completed in 2001 was subsequently bombed in 2017 and then rebuilt using insurance guarantees of the United States. 

Khoury said because of the US, the power plant and desalination plant survived pretty much unscathed from two years of Israeli bombing.

Ziad Khoury, who oversees Khoury Group’s international operations and its Gulf Steel Industries civil engineering division in Aqaba, stated they are prepared to be loyal partners to Brendan Bechtel, owner and CEO of Arlington, Virginia-based Bechtel Corporation, and Nassef Sawiris, owner and CEO of Cairo, Egypt-based Orascom Construction PLC to rebuild Gaza.

Ziad Khoury, whose company constructed the Intel headquarters in Be’er Sheva, a traffic bridge in Tel Aviv, and the Dead Sea Works Desalination facility, said they are prepared to take on critical infrastructure projects not only in Gaza, Syria, and Lebanon, but also in Ukraine—particularly at the port of Odesa.

Bechtel and Orascom are unsure about rebuilding Gaza, but the Khoury Group in Be’er Sheva says it can start construction right away.

[Bechtel Chairman and CEO Brendan P. Bechtel speaks to Capitol Intelligence using CI Glass at Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, DC. December 18, 2017]

The Trump plan will also force Israel, Egypt and Jordan to cut ties with Chinese companies, especially in military and sensitive communication hubs like the ports of Haifa and Aqaba.

However, even more popular that President Trump, is the presidential daughter Ivanka, who many credit for the creation of the DFC and the World Bank’s IFC – International Finance Corporation  Women’s Entrepreneur Finance (WE-FI) Initiative program to finance women owned business in the developing world.

“Ivanka Trump is our welcome guest anywhere and anytime,” says Ziad Khoury.

By PK Semler in Nablus, West Bank; Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Nazareth and Umm El-Fahem, Israel and Aqaba, Jordan. For more information, email pks@capitolintelgroup.com

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