By Jeff Mason and Yara Bayoumy NEW YORK (Reuters) – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas expressed optimism on Wednesday about reaching a peace agreement with Israel this year and said U.S. President Donald Trump’s commitment to the issue would help create the „deal of the century” in the region.Abbas met Trump on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly gathering of world leaders in New York and thanked him for his support.”If this is any proof to anything … it attests to the seriousness of your Excellency, Mr. President, to achieve the deal of the century in the Middle East during this year or in the coming months, God willing,” Abbas said through an interpreter.Trump said his team of advisers was working very hard on the issue, as were Israel, Saudi Arabia and other nations.”I think we have a very, very good chance, and I certainly will devote everything within my heart and within my soul to get that deal made,” Trump said.”We’re at a very important juncture, there’s a small period of time, and we’re going to see what we can do. There can be no promises, obviously,” he said.Abbas noted that the Palestinians had met with Trump’s team more than 20 times since the U.S. president entered office in January, and he said the fact that Jews and Muslims were celebrating a new year was a positive sign.”This is a very sweet coincidence that we can celebrate the new year together within a 24-hour period, and if this is an indication to anything, it means that we can coexist peacefully together,” Abbas said.Later at the U.N. gathering, Abbas urged the 193-nation body to end the „Israeli occupation of the state of Palestine” within a set timetable.He also borrowed a campaign line of Trump’s, using the phrase „draining the swamp” as an argument for addressing the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. Trump used a similar phrase as a presidential candidate to criticize politicians and policy making in Washington.”Beyond any doubt, draining the swamp of colonial occupation of our land and ending its unjust, oppressive and illegal practices against our people would greatly affect the fight against terrorism, depriving terrorist groups of one of the key rallying cries they exploit to promote their repugnant ideas,” Abbas said in his prepared remarks.Trump met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier in the week. The Israeli and Palestinian leaders both went out of their way to praise the U.S. president.The White House played down both meetings in terms of their significance toward peace talks on one of the world’s most intractable conflicts that has defied the peacemaking efforts of several U.S. administrations going back decades.The Palestinians seek to establish an independent state in the Israeli occupied West Bank, territory captured in the 1967 Middle East war and the Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital.The Palestinian Authority’s ambassador to the United States, Husam Zomlot, said “the meeting was forward-looking, and the conversation was deep and frank between the two allies.”The Palestinian Authority said in a statement Abbas told Trump that „peace can be achieved through implementing the two-state solution based on the 1967 borders.” Abbas also said „the illegal Israeli settlements policy poses an immediate threat” to that.For at least two decades, the goal of U.S.-led diplomacy has been a “two-state solution”, meaning an independent Palestinian state living side-by-side and at peace with Israel.But neither Trump nor his aides have publicly recommitted to a two-state solution, instead saying it is up to the two parties to work out in peace talks.Abbas’ insistence on a return to 1967 pre-war borders is something Israel has repeatedly rejected.(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Grant McCool and James Dalgleish)

By Andrew Osborn MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia is „extremely concerned” by U.S. President Donald Trump’s comments questioning the Iran nuclear deal and suspects that Washington itself may have violated a landmark arms control treaty, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.Lavrov’s comments, made to Russian reporters at the United Nations in New York and published by his ministry on Wednesday, illustrate how deeply Moscow and Washington are at odds over an array of issues and suggest any attempts to improve already battered relations face an uphill struggle.Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, Trump said Iran’s 2015 pact with six world powers to curb its nuclear program in return for loosening economic sanctions was „an embarrassment to the United States”. Washington could not abide by an agreement „if it provides cover for the eventual construction of a nuclear program,” Trump said.Lavrov, whose country is a signatory to the deal, said Russia strongly disagreed with that stance.”It’s extremely worrying,” he said. „We will defend this document, this consensus, which was met with relief by the entire international community and genuinely strengthened both regional and international security.”Trump’s threat in the same U.N. appearance to „totally destroy” North Korea if it had to defend itself or it allies also went down badly with Russia, which shares a border with North Korea and believes negotiations and diplomacy are the only way to resolve a crisis over Pyongyang’s missile program.”If you simply condemn and threaten, then we’re going to antagonize countries over whom we want to exert influence,” said Lavrov, referring to Trump’s comments.He saved some of his harshest criticism however for what he said was a possible violation by the United States of a landmark 1987 arms control treaty which bans Russian and American intermediate-range missiles on land.A senior Trump administration official accused Russia earlier this year of violating the same pact — the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty — something Moscow denied.But Lavrov said it looked like it was Washington, which is in the midst of a $1 trillion, 30-year modernization of its aging ballistic missile submarines, bombers and land-based missiles, that was in breach of the same treaty.”We have suspicions on at least three fronts that the Americans are creating weapons systems which violate or could violate the treaty obligations,” said Lavrov, who said Moscow had relayed its concerns to the United States.Lavrov has met U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson twice in New York this week.(Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Iran says it does not expect U.S. to leave nuclear dealBy Steve Holland and John Irish Reuters•September 21, 2017 Iran says it does not expect U.S. to leave nuclear deal By Steve Holland and John Irish UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Iran said on Wednesday it did not expect the United States to abandon the Iranian nuclear deal as U.S. officials sent mixed signals on what they plan to do about the international accord.Related SearchesIran Nuclear DealTrump Deal With DemocratsTrump Daca DealA collapse of the 2015 deal, which U.S. President Donald Trump has called „an embarrassment” but which is supported by the other major powers that negotiated it with Iran, could upend relations in the Middle East and trigger a regional arms race.Iranian President Hassan Rouhani vowed that his country would not be the first to violate the agreement under which Tehran agreed to restrict its nuclear program in return for the loosening of economic sanctions that had crippled its economy.”We don’t think Trump will walk out of the deal despite (his) rhetoric and propaganda,” Rouhani told reporters on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly gathering of world leaders. He also ruled out the idea of renegotiating the pact.”Either the nuclear deal remains as it is or it will collapse,” he added.Trump, who on Tuesday called the pact „one of the worst and most one-sided transactions the United States has ever entered into,” told reporters he had made up his mind whether to keep the pact but declined to disclose his decision.Trump must decide by Oct. 15 whether to certify that Iran is complying with the pact, a decision that could sink the deal. If he does not, the U.S. Congress has 60 days to decide whether to reimpose sanctions waived under the accord.A senior U.S. official said Trump is leaning toward not certifying that Iran is complying with the pact and letting Congress effectively decide whether to kill the agreement.The official said Trump could always change his mind before the deadline and noted he publicly and privately has fumed about the deal, feeling the United States was taken advantage of.A source familiar with the U.S. discussions said the Trump administration is also considering ways to leave the agreement intact, sanction Iran for its missile tests and support for extremist groups, and then seek to strengthen the pact.Speaking at the U.N. General Assembly of world leaders, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani responded forcefully to Trump’s pugnacious speech on Tuesday by saying Iran would not be pushed around by a relative newcomer to the world stage.But he also said Iran desired to preserve its accord with six world powers under which Tehran agreed to restrict its nuclear program for at least a decade in return for the loosening of economic sanctions that crippled its economy.”The Islamic Republic of Iran will not be the first country to violate the agreement,” Rouhani said, adding that Iran would respond „decisively and resolutely” to a violation by any party.”It will be a great pity if this agreement were to be destroyed by ‘rogue’ newcomers to the world of politics: the world will have lost a great opportunity,” he said in a dig at Trump, who on Tuesday called Iran a „rogue” state.Trump, a businessman and former reality TV star whose first elected office is the presidency, told reporters, „I have decided,” when asked if he had made up his mind after having criticized the accord in his own U.N. speech on Tuesday.But he declined to say what he decided.U.S. officials have sent mixed signals about the nuclear agreement Iran hammered out with six major powers – Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States.The Republican president hinted on Tuesday that he may not recertify the pact, negotiated by his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama. „I don’t think you’ve heard the last of it,” he said.The seven nations that negotiated the agreement met at the United Nations, marking the first time U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif had met in the same room.The prospect of Washington reneging on the agreement has worried some U.S. partners that helped negotiate it, especially as the world grapples with North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile development.French President Emmanuel Macron said it would be a mistake to pull out of the pact. „We have to keep the 2015 agreement because it was a good one,” he told reporters.However, an official from a Gulf nation suggested that his nation could accept the deal’s collapse. Should Trump either not certify Iranian compliance or withdraw from the deal entirely, the Gulf official said: „I think we can live with that.”(Reporting by Yara Bayoumy, Parisa Hafezi, Steve Holland, John Irish, Michelle Nichols, Jeff Mason and Arshad Mohammed at the United Nations, Patricia Zengerle, John Walcott and Susan Heavey in Washington, Andrew Osborn in Moscow and Babak Dehghanpisheh in Beirut; Writing by Arshad Mohammed; Editing by Grant McCool and James Dalgleish)