Council without love: Russia has not yet decided on its participation in the Trump structure

Moscow has not yet formulated a position on participation in the US-created "Peace Council," Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Izvestia. The initiative, designed to become a new platform for conflict resolution, faces serious problems in the context of the war around Iran. Experts interviewed by Izvestia agree that it actually lost its meaning after the start of a large-scale attack by the United States and Israel on the Islamic Republic.

Russia is in no hurry to make a decision on Trump's initiative

The "Peace Council" was established in January as an element of the American plan to resolve the conflict in the Gaza Strip. Initially, it was assumed that the structure would focus on the restoration of the exclave and the coordination of international financial assistance. This approach was also reflected in the UN Security Council resolution. Moscow has not yet decided on its participation in the Peace Council, Dmitry Peskov told Izvestia.

"No position has been formed on this issue yet," the Kremlin spokesman said.

Already at the stage of approving the charter, the format of the council was significantly changed. The document did not explicitly mention Gaza, and the Council's mission was interpreted much more broadly as promoting sustainable peace in conflict-affected or threatened regions. This caused concern among a number of countries and experts, who saw in the draft an attempt to create an alternative international mechanism outside the UN framework.

At the first meeting of the structure on February 19, significant financial commitments were announced from a number of States in the Middle East and Central Asia. The United States has also announced its intention to make a major contribution. At the same time, Washington was counting on the participation of Russia and China in the implementation of the initiative.

The Russian Federation approached the proposal with caution. President Vladimir Putin instructed the Foreign Ministry to study the project documents and consult with partners. Moscow emphasized that the Russian side still has a significant number of questions to be answered. At the same time, the possibility of financial assistance in the amount of $1 billion from assets frozen in the United States was allowed, provided that the council's activities would contribute to a long-term settlement of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict based on internationally recognized solutions.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has previously noted that sustainable peace in the Middle East is unattainable without the creation of a Palestinian state. Skepticism towards the initiative was also shown in Europe — a number of Western countries refused to participate in the new format.

At the moment, the Peace Council continues to formally build a financial infrastructure — as Politico magazine reported, citing a representative of the US administration, the structure has already opened accounts with the World Bank and JPMorgan Chase. We are currently working with States that have previously announced financial commitments to transfer funds. At the same time, the process is technical in nature and has not yet been accompanied by the full launch of the council's activities.

Jamal Wakim, a professor at the Lebanese University, believes that the "Peace Council" was originally an attempt by the United States not only to undermine the authority of the Palestinian Authority and present its political representation as secondary, but also to create an alternative international body instead of the UN, consolidating Washington's absolute leadership.

— These plans have now failed after the United States attempted to overthrow the regime in Iran, which led to the outbreak of a large-scale regional conflict. The final assessment of the initiative will become possible only after the end of the confrontation, but already now the consequences of the US actions can significantly weaken their influence in the region if Iran and the armed groups supporting it remain stable, the expert told Izvestia.

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The conflict in Iran undermines the work of the "Peace Council"

Against this background, the attention of the international community shifted to the military confrontation, which effectively paralyzed the work of the council. According to media reports, the Indonesian leadership has already expressed dissatisfaction with the lack of tangible results for the Palestinian people and allowed the possibility of withdrawing from the project. The Indonesian Foreign Ministry announced the de facto suspension of all negotiations through the council due to the war with Iran, which calls into question the participation of Jakarta, including plans to send 8,000 troops to the international stabilization force.

Egyptian international relations specialist Tarek al-Bardisi believes that the escalation around Iran has not just undermined the idea of the "Peace Council", but actually deprived it of its content, demonstrating the gap between declarations and reality. According to him, the initiative initially looked attractive at the level of political rhetoric, but proved unable to function in a real military crisis. In a situation where key players are involved in a violent confrontation, such mechanisms, in fact, lose their legal capacity.

— The "Peace Council" was created in the logic of de-escalation, while everything is moving towards a new round of conflict. On paper, it may still look convincing. In practice, it doesn't work. The "Peace Council" did not become either the creator of peace, or even a real mediator — it's just a loud name at a very inopportune time, which became rather a bitter irony," Tarek al—Bardisi shared with Izvestia.

According to orientalist Leonid Tsukanov, the escalation around Iran has called into question the previously achieved diplomatic developments on the Palestinian-Israeli settlement. In these circumstances, the Hamas movement has taken advantage of the distraction of international attention to strengthen its position in the Gaza Strip, which complicates both the prospects for its disarmament and the transition to the next stage of the peace process.

— In part, we can say that the format of the "Peace Council" is temporarily frozen. At this stage, the platform acts more as an additional lever of influence of the United States on the participants of the initiative, including as part of the campaign to attract them to the anti-Iranian coalition. However, the practical meaning of the Palestinian-Israeli issue seems to have been lost," the expert told Izvestia.

As a result, the initiative, which claimed to be a new decision-making center in the field of international security, lost its practical content in a short time. After all, the structure, originally conceived as a platform for collective crisis resolution, found itself in a situation where its initiator was involved in a large-scale military confrontation in the region.