The periphery’s translation of the centre: Trump’s Middle East Peace Plan in Arabic

This article explores how the former American President’s Middle East Peace Plan, announced in 2020 and widely referred to in Arabic as Safaqat al-Qarn (‘The Deal of the Century’), is framed and received in Arabic. Addressing the ethics of translation, it investigates the prominent paratextual elements accompanying the publication of the Arabic translation. Through descriptive analysis, the article examines how the Arabic periphery resorts to paratexts to debunk the original text, which seems to serve the interests of a powerful centre, by consolidating a colonial discourse and repackaging it as an offer of peace. The article considers the American reconceptualisation and the Arabic translation of the interrelated concepts of refugees and nakba, which are pivotal in Palestinian national memory and possess established meanings in international fora, including the UN. Contrary to their widely accepted historical presence in relevant international documents and plans, including former American initiatives, the referential values of these two key concepts are reversed and muted in the original text. By openly rejecting the principle of ‘fidelity’ to the original as a politically and morally compromised strategy, the Arabic mediation articulates an ethics of translation appropriate for confronting the oppressive force of the colonial other.