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President Donald Trump on Thursday in Davos, Switzerland, openly accused the Palestinians of disrespecting the United States and boldly threatened to freeze aid worth hundred of millions of dollars until the Palestinian leadership agrees to US-brokered talks with Tel Aviv.

Trump’s rhetoric against Palestinian leadership in Ramallah came across with a significantly more demanding tone than previously when he said that the Palestinians had, “disrespected us a week ago by not allowing our great vice president to see them.” Trump was referring to Palestinian leadership refusing to meet with U.S. Vice President Mike Pence when he was on a trip in the region.

“We give them hundreds of millions,” Trump said during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu among the snow-capped hills of Davos. “That money is not going to them unless they sit down and negotiate peace,” Trump said to Netanyahu.

For months now the Trump Administration has been pushing the doubtful Palestinians to enter into a U.S.-brokered peace process that has so far only shown any benefits for Israel. Trump’s son-in-law and envoy to the peace process has achieved nothing and many analysts in the region wonder if he even attempted to do little more than make promises to the Israelis, leaving the Palestinians outside of all talks.

The Palestinians became infuriated by Trump’s unconventional decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital – which broke with decades of international consensus that the city would be the subject of negotiation. This break with the status quo has brought condemnation from the Riyadh to Rome. Weeks of demonstrations in and around Jerusalem left a number of Palestinians dead and injured. Meanwhile, other demonstrations elsewhere saw fires set outside American consulates and embassies.

Amid the unrest and political pressure at home, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas responded by cancelling a planned meeting with U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, who had been visiting Israel.

On Thursday, the Palestinians rejected Trump’s threat with one senior Palestinian official calling Trump an “oppressor.” A spokesperson for President Abbas said that they would not be meeting with the U.S. administration until it withdrew its recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Meanwhile, as Trump was speaking in Davos, his ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley was also turning up the heat on the 82-year-old Palestinian leader, Abbas.

Haley accused the Palestinian president of lacking courage needed to form a peace deal. “To get historic results, we need courageous leaders,” she said.

Earlier in January Abbas accused Trump of attempting to make the Palestinians a scapegoat by painting them as rejecting peace talks that simply do not exist. “Shame on you,” Abbas said at the time. He denounced Trump’s peace efforts as the “slap of the century.”

So far Trump has held true to his promise to cut aid to the Palestinians with the United Nationals Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees being the first to see a cut. The U.S. held back half of their annual contribution causing UNRWS to scramble to find fresh donors. It is unknown at this time what other funding Trump plans to cut.

*(Trump and Netanyahu at Davos from January 25, 2018. Image credit: AFP)