Will Trump’s board of peace replace the UN?

0:00This is The Guardian.

0:06Today, the Board of Peace with a billion-dollar price tag.

0:17What do you call an elitist club that's welcomed men wanted for war crimes, billionaire businessmen, and Tony Blair as its members? Well, if you're President Trump, it's his brand new Board of Peace. The President called it the greatest and most prestigious board ever assembled at any time. His list of invitees includes Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin said it was studying the proposal and hoping to get further clarification. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to join the so-called Gaza Board of Peace despite facing an international criminal court arrest warrant for war crimes in the Strip.

0:56If only it was a joke. Months ago, the president promised that bringing peace to Gaza would come in phases. This long and difficult war has now ended in an unprecedented achievement. Virtually the entire region has endorsed the plan that Gaza... Through a 20-point peace plan sketched out by the White House. And as world leaders gather in Davos amid a blizzard of global tensions, we're now apparently in phase two of that process, in which mention of Gaza, of bringing security and hope to Palestinians, has been sidelined. And instead, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Vladimir Putin have been invited to join an international board chaired by Trump in the name of global peace.

1:41One of them accused of leading a genocide against Palestinians. The other for crimes against humanity in Ukraine. Vladimir Putin's invitation, a leader who shows no interest in any kind of peace deal, being invited to this board of peace, which is supposed to bring stability and peace around the world. It's the ultimate in absurdities.

2:11Astonishing, beyond belief. And there's more. From The Guardian, I'm Nashin Iqbal. Today in Focus, is Donald Trump trying to bulldoze the United Nations?

2:30Julian Borgia, you're a senior international correspondent at The Guardian. You've formerly been posted in Jerusalem, Washington DC, now in London. Before we get to discussing who's who on this so-called board of peace, do you want to take a stab at understanding what Donald Trump has described as the greatest and most prestigious board ever assembled at any time, any place, and just explain what it's going to do? Well, explaining what it's supposed to do is really take a shot at the dark at the moment. And what the UN thought it was going to do when it endorsed it in November was that it was going to oversee a peace process in Gaza.

3:11Now, that's not what it says on the Charter that's just been published. In fact, there's not one mention of the word Gaza in the Charter. It really seems to be setting itself up almost like the UN, maybe the UN Security Council. but cross between that and the Mar-a-Lago club where you pay big bucks to be able to sit at the table and be close to Trump who will be in charge of everything. And so what does that mean for the running of Gaza? I mean will this board have control over the region and what happens to the everyday infrastructure, hospitals, all that sort of stuff? Yeah that's the really the amazing thing about this UN resolution in November where they handed over Gaza to this very vaguely defined Board of Peace for two years.

4:02An adoption of resolution today demonstrates the overwhelming support for the president's vision for a stable Gaza where Palestinians determine their own destiny, free from terrorist rule and violence. Even though it wasn't known then who was going to be on it, But it gave that board sort of supreme power over Gaza. Now, that doesn't mean that it will be running it day to day. There's an executive board for Gaza under the Board of Peace. And then under that, there is a committee of Palestinian technocrats who are supposed to be doing the day to day running. How all of that will work is really unclear.

4:43Just yesterday, the United Nations Security Council formally adopted my peace plan and officially endorsed the Board of Peace. This is a board like no other. It will have the heads of... The general understanding is that what Trump says goes. It doesn't matter who else is on the Board of Peace, although they presumably have a say. But the way the charter has been set up, it's really Trump has individually the last say in every decision. Israel and everybody involved asked me to do this. So I'd be headed by a gentleman known as President Donald J. Trump of the United States. That's what I want is some extra work to do.

5:26And what qualifies members to join the board and who gets to decide on that admission? Is it solely Trump? Yes, it is solely Trump. This is what this is all about. It is Mar-a-Lago on a global scale. He gets to say who joins. He gets to say when they can speak. He gets to say when they can vote. And he can say when they get to be dismissed, if he doesn't like them anymore. If a member, a national leader, does something to displease him, contradicts him, you can imagine him pulling out his finger and saying, you're fired. And so it would be very much at the whim of Trump. All right, so Trump's proposed Board of Peace is under fire tonight after reports allege there may be a price tag.

6:09Trump is proposing that member states be limited to three-year terms. How much truth is there in what we're reading about this admission policy that to qualify to be on the board, you must pay a billion dollars? Yes, if you want to be a permanent member of the board and not be subject to a three-year term limit, you could pay a billion dollars and stay on it. Obviously, the main reason for joining and paying a billion dollars is you get to sit at the top table near Trump. And when you have Trump's ear, who knows what advantages you might get for yourself or for your country. And this is really the model that Trump is trying to create, sort of Holy Roman Empire of the 21st century, where there's one supreme ruler and everyone competes with each other to try and get his ear in order to get his favour, his imperial favour.

7:06Do we have any idea where that money will go? Because, you know, billionaires aren't stupid when it comes to making money. And the idea that they're going to make peace in places is devastated by war in Gaza, you know, it suggests that they're looking for a return on their investment. And so I wonder, what is it that they're going to get for their billion dollars? What you get for it is to stay on the board. Where it will go remains vague, unclear. It's not laid out.

7:40And countries are weighing up whether they want to take up those invitations to join the US President's Board of Peace. The US-led initiative is being billed as a new mechanism for resolving global conflict. Julian, you're a fairly close watcher of the sort of movers and shakers of global power across the world. And so I wonder if you can talk me through the names. Who is actually on this Board of Peace? Well, there are two levels, really. There is the head of state level, which is really the top table. And then there's an executive board. So on the top table, head of government, head of state, we've had confirmed yeses from Viktor Orban in Hungary, Javier Mille in Argentina, the head of the Vietnamese Communist Party, Tam Lo, presidents of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan have all said yes.

8:30And then alongside that table is the executive board who is supposed to run things. It involves Steve Wyckoff, a special envoy and a property developer who was a friend of Donald Trump's and Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Plus a billionaire called Mark Rowan who runs something called Apollo Global Management and has given a lot of money to Trump in the past. And we'll have a board and one of the people that wants to be on the board is the UK former Prime Minister Tony Blair, good man, very good man, and some others. And it'll be quite the board working. Everybody wants to be on it now.

9:14I mean, on the one hand, at governance level, you at least have leaders of their countries or people high up in the political chain, your Orbans, Malays, autocrats from Central Asia, and then on the other, Tony Blair and a motley crew of businessmen. Julian, how does that work and how does it look? Well, it's fair to say that Tony Blair, for example, is not a popular figure in the Middle East. He is still remembered for his role in the invasion of Iraq, of course, and then he was the quartet representative in the Middle East and not remember for making any progress there. So not widely beloved in the region, though popular among the Gulf monarchies and close to Trump.

10:03You know, first I want to find out that Tony would be popular with all, because I just don't know that. And I like Tony, I've always liked Tony, but I want to find out that he's an acceptable choice to everybody. Tony Blair, from everything we read, was instrumental in creating the 20-point peace plan, but he's not particularly an expert on the region, is he? Or on Gaza, I should say. Well, Tony Blair did have his time as the quartet representative headquartered in Jerusalem. Whether he achieved anything in his time there is open to debate. Shouldn't you be in Gaza? What are you doing in London rather than in Gaza, Mr Blair?

10:43As the Middle East was drawn into a vortex of deepening regional conflict, Tony Blair was accused of conflicts of interest, lining his pockets with lucrative deals. Many in the region felt that having led Britain into war, Mr Blair made an odd peace envoy. We have to understand that this toxic mix between religion and politics... He focused on economic issues rather than the political as not really, certainly not beloved of most Palestinians who didn't see any real change in their lives and just saw the continuation of settlement building, for example, in the West Bank.

11:27Julian, while many of us have been rushing to try and understand how the board will work, what it entails, what it will do, in the meantime, Trump threw us another major curveball. Vladimir Putin has been invited to President Trump's Board of Peace. It's a surprising choice. Have you invited President Putin to be a member of the Board of Peace? Yeah, he's been invited. He's one of the people, these are world leaders, and the answer is yes. What does that mean? And is it even possible that he could accept a position on a Board of Peace while continuing to wage war in Ukraine? Well, Vladimir Putin waging war in Ukraine and being responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people is clearly not a barrier in Trump's mind to joining a board of peace.

12:18Trump clearly doesn't see it that way. He sees the board of peace as being the strong men from around the world who get around a table and thrash things out. In the Charter, it says it will take a pragmatic approach to peacemaking and rejecting the failed methods and institutions that went before, presumably a swipe at the UN. Trump has always had this vision that really, if the big, powerful men got around the table, they would solve things easily. And we've seen this, of course, in Ukraine, where in his view, his vision of peace in Ukraine, is him and Vladimir Putin carve up the country, cut it in half and call it a peace.

13:04So this isn't really entirely out of line or out of character for Trump. And Julian, just as we were getting over the shock of Putin, then of course there's news that Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, has accepted an invitation to join this Board of Peace. I mean, with Netanyahu, this is someone else who has been invited to join while having waged a war that has killed tens of thousands of people. So it is of a like with Putin. But this is the way, clearly, that Trump envisages the Board of Peace, that you bring on the strong men of their region. And once round the table with Trump, these strong men who are going to run the world and carve up the world will come to an agreement and wars will end.

13:53Well, there's strong men and then there's alleged war criminals. Both are wanted by the International Criminal Court. They have warrants out for their arrest. And of course, Netanyahu has presided over the exact crisis in which this board was formed for, which was ostensibly peace for Gaza. Yes, I don't think Trump sees the ironies and the paradoxes there. He does not see wars the way that most of the international community see them, doesn't see it the way that the International Criminal Court sees them. He, in any conflict, is clearly looking for the stronger party and is seeking to bring peace by making the weaker party, in this case, Palestinians in Gaza, cede territory, cede all sorts of concessions.

14:42So he's taken the same approach in Gaza as he is in Ukraine. And of course, we are talking about the Board of Peace. It is a big story. But none of this came up in his extensive rambling speech at Davos. No, it was very hard to make head or tail of the speech. It was just a riff. A lot of it was domestic campaign material that he uses again and again, and he just has on automatic. He'd obviously come to talk about Greenland for a lot of time. He called it Iceland. Not there for us on Iceland, that I can tell you. I mean, our stock market took the first dip yesterday because of Iceland. So Iceland's already cost us a lot of money.

15:23But as far as we know, he's still talking about Greenland. He wants to take over. And that seemed to take precedence. The Board of Peace, with all the emphasis that he's put on it, he didn't mention once. Is that deliberate? Well, it is so far not being a big success because not very many people have signed up so far. So there's not so much to boast about yet. And what about closer to home? And I'm thinking of our own Prime Minister, of Keir Starmer, of Emmanuel Macron, who's been quite robust in his defence of Greenland, for instance, with Trump. I mean, do we know what their positions are on this?

15:56Well, we only really know the French position. French officials have been briefing the press saying Macron will not be joining. French President Emmanuel Macron has rejected President Donald Trump's invitation to join a proposed Board of Peace overseeing Gaza, citing concerns it could undermine the United Nations. Did he say that? Well, nobody wants him because he's going to be out of office very soon. So, you know, that's all right. What I'll do is if they feel like Costo, I'll put a 200 percent tariff on his wines and champagnes and he'll join. But he doesn't have to join. And as a result, Trump has threatened French wine with 200 percent tariffs, you know, as a punitive measure.

16:38So this clearly is not a voluntary board. There is a price to pay for not joining. And so you have Keir Starmer, for example, but also the other European leaders in a really difficult position. Wow. So a price to pay to be on it if you're part of the billionaire club and a price to pay if you're not going to accept the invitation if you're a leader of a country. Yes. You have to remember that Trump's formative years were in the New York property development industry in the 70s and 80s. And that's where he learned how to do business, which is largely through threats, to get his way through threats.

17:15And that's what you're seeing here. And it's not just about who's on it, but who's been excluded. And I think, I mean, notably women or perhaps Palestinians. I mean, we have not yet heard from a woman leader who's saying that she'd been invited. Probably the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has been invited. But yes, so far, at least the acceptances have only come from sort of strong men, either autocrats or liberal leaders in South America and Europe. But you're right, the Palestinians are entirely missing from, A, the board, and secondly, from the executive board. They are really in a junior role in this Palestinian technocratic committee that will take orders from the executive board and the board of peace.

18:08So they are really in a subordinate position in this setup.

18:19Julian, this has been described as phase two of Trump's peace plan for the region, which would imply that phase one, i.e. the ceasefire, has been completed. What is the current situation in Gaza between Israel and Hamas? Well, in phase one, there was an exchange between the hostages held by Hamas and prisoners held by Israel. The IDF, the Israeli army, withdrew to a yellow ceasefire line under which they still control more than half of Gaza. There have been more deliveries of food and aid, yet far less than is needed. And there is still daily bombardment. There is a reduced level of killing, but over 450 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire began.

19:08And that's down on the average for this war, which was an incredibly bloody war. But it would still count as a major conflict anywhere else in the world. And from everything you've read and understood, how will this board potentially enforce the peace that's in its actual name? Well, this is the really difficult question about how does the Board of Peace make peace in Gaza? First, it has to somehow get into Gaza. The idea is this Palestinian technocratic committee will at some point be allowed to go in. But first, there has to be some kind of disarmament of Hamas. Hamas has to accept that this new government is going to go in.

19:51And so that's the question of who is going to provide security. There's supposed to be an international stabilization force. Various Arab and Islamic countries have in theory said they might be interested in providing troops. but no one wants to be the one who goes up to Hamas and says give us your guns. Now there's another possibility there's a Palestinian police force that's been trained in Jordan and Egypt. They could possibly go in under the sort of cover of the stabilization force if and when it's constituted and it's possible that Hamas will accept to hand over at least their heavy weapons to that police force.

20:33But really, you know, the big question is who are going to be the boots on the ground? And that is unanswered. And what about when it comes to rebuilding the region? Because there were reports quite a few months ago that Trump, of course, had designs on making Gaza and Riviera in the Middle East. And I don't want to be cute. I don't want to be a wise guy. But the Riviera of the Middle East, this could be something that could be so bad. This could be so magnificent. But more importantly than that. How much of that is a potential reality? And what will it take to rebuild Gaza? All of that, the idea of a rebuilt Gaza metropolis on the Mediterranean, it seems an awful long way away.

21:16People can't even go back to their homes and start rebuilding. And part because many of them are beyond the yellow line, the ceasefire line, or near the yellow line, in which case if you approach that yellow line, you risk your lives. There's no security to go back and try and rebuild your home. And there is no heavy equipment, the diggers, the bulldozers, the sort of equipment that the international community would need to really start clearing the rubble, which is an enormous job. And at the moment, Israel is not letting anything like that come in. And there is a real question over whether Israel has any incentive to move on to the next stage.

21:56There's no sign from Israel that it would be prepared to contemplate any of that. And so in the meantime, Palestinians having to eke out this really difficult existence in Gaza. As you've said, homes destroyed, really difficult winter. And I just wonder, given that there's all this talk at the top of this board of peace, there's just not a lot of discussion of what Palestinians need or want right now. And Julian, do we know about the feeling amongst the public on what's being discussed by Trump and his allies? Palestinians in Gaza just desperately hoping that something comes of it, that Trump calls Netanyahu's bluff and forces through some kind of change, some kind of law and order returns to Gaza, and that they are able to go back to their homes and start rebuilding.

22:43They're still under bombardment from the sea, from the air, on land, and not really being able to restart their lives. They're stuck in this purgatory. It's not as bad as full-on war, but it's a long, long way from peace.

23:02Coming up, will Trump's Board of Peace replace the United Nations?

23:24I wish the United Nations could do more. I wish we didn't need a board of peace. But the United Nations, you know, with all the wars I settled, the United Nations never helped me on one war. Julian, it's now pretty much a year since Trump retook his position at the White House in his second term. And he seems to have remodeled the world in his image in some ways, including this board, which, you know, might have seemed unthinkable not that long ago. So does it suggest to you that this is part of a larger Trumpian project for global peacekeeping? It's definitely a Trumpian project. Whether it's about global peacekeeping is another thing.

24:04I think that is the title put on it. But it is a way of running the world in which he takes primacy. And it cannot be seen as separate from his more imperialist ambitions. He wants to remake the world where all the institutions are institutions that he runs. The UN just hasn't been very helpful. I'm a big fan of the UN potential, but it has never lived up to its potential. The UN should have... Julian, if Trump is trying to rule and control the world with this Board of Peace and forcing other countries to sign up, where on earth does that leave the UN? Well, the UN has been left sidelined. And I think if you look back to November, they were clearly hoodwinked.

24:51They were bamboozled into voting at the Security Council for this border peace because they thought this was the way to keep Trump on board with a Gaza peace process. It was all about Gaza. And so although it was really vague and it cut across the sort of decolonization traditions of the UN by putting the US in charge. It was felt the only way to keep Trump on board with the peace process. And now, a couple of months later, it turns out it's really not about Gaza at all. It is about a Trump ego trip. It's about him having a club like the G7, G20, but with him very much in charge. He's the only individual named in the charter, and not as a president of the United States, but as him, Donald J.

25:39Trump. He could remain in charge of this beyond his own presidency? Yes, he could remain. Wow. Absolutely. It is not about being president of the United States. It's about being Donald J. Trump, which we all know is central to his view on the world. Did no one read the small print on this vote? Would anyone have not seen that that's what it had said? Like it's Trump himself, not the president of the US? at the time they voted it looked completely different it looked like a board of you know world leaders who would be invested in some way in in gaza peace but now they've sort of woken up and realize it's been what they call in the u.s bait and switch people think they're buying something and they actually get something completely different and just to try and understand trump's psychology for a moment is it fair to say then that this is entirely about his ego and his interests?