Peace Board Adds Democratic Liaison to Push Gaza Plan Past 2028

The Board of Peace is hiring Shelley Greenspan, who served as President Joe Biden's liaison to the Jewish community, to lead congressional outreach as it seeks support for President Donald Trump's 20-point Gaza peace plan.

Greenspan starts next week. She reports to senior advisers Josh Gruenbaum and Aryeh Lightstone and will focus on Democratic lawmakers. The board's statement said her work at the White House, National Security Council and State Department gave her standing with both parties: "Sustained, bipartisan support from Congress is essential to the work ahead, and Shelley is uniquely capable of leading this effort."

Her resume spans several sectors. She worked on Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign research team, spent time at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and held management and policy roles at technology companies including Amazon. She also served at the State Department and on the National Security Council on global partnerships, and Biden appointed her in 2022 as his liaison to the Jewish community. She is the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors.

Greenspan said she was honored to join at such a consequential time. "At the State Department, I worked to advance the President's vision for peace and prosperity in the Middle East and saw how the President's 20-Point Plan can tangibly deliver for the peoples of Gaza and Israel," she said. "I look forward to continuing that work with the Board."

The administration's plan for the board and the Gaza framework extends beyond the current term. Officials want the initiatives to outlast President Donald Trump and to carry into a future Democratic presidency, if one is elected in 2028. The Abraham Accords offer a cautionary precedent. President Donald Trump announced normalization agreements with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan in 2020 during his first term, aiming to add Indonesia and Saudi Arabia to that list. After President Joe Biden took office in January 2021, his administration did not advance new agreements, and critics said it avoided the name Abraham Accords to deny him credit. Not until June 2023 did then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken name Dan Shapiro, a former US ambassador to Israel, as senior adviser for regional integration and special envoy for expanding the Abraham Accords at the State Department.

Democrats have already offered support for the framework. Former US ambassador to Israel Jack Lew, former senior Biden administration adviser Brett McGurk and Hillary Clinton have spoken in favor of it. Clinton wrote in the Financial Times several months ago that "the 20-point plan is not the one many of us would have drafted, but it remains the only framework backed by sufficient leverage, political engagement and potential resources to move the parties towards implementation."

The Board of Peace is continuing to seek backing from Republicans and Democrats for both the board and the Gaza plan. Greenspan's appointment puts a Biden-era official in charge of the outreach to lawmakers in the other party.