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Donald Trump's much-vaunted peace plan for the Middle East appears to be in deepening trouble - before it has even been unveiled.

Trump's officials have hyped it as the "deal of the century".

We have been waiting for the details for more than a year, but Palestinians and veteran US diplomats have told Sky News it may end up doing more harm than good.

This week, the Palestinians' chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat, told Sky's Middle East correspondent, Alex Rossi, the Americans are cutting out his side of the conflict as they prepare to announce their plan.

It was an illuminating interview revealing a deep-seated frustration with the Americans.

Erekat has had multiple meetings with US officials, including the president's son-in-law and Middle East peace envoy Jared Kushner.

But he says "they haven't shared a single sentence with me about what they intend to do".

He fears a fait accompli is coming, imposed on the Palestinians by the Americans and Israelis with the acquiescence of Sunni Arab governments.

Erekat added: "They want to say to me, 'come here boy, we know what's best for you and if you don't accept this you're going to be called a terrorist, we're going to cut your aid, close your schools, shut your hospitals, starve your children'... and this is happening in 2018."

If you want a deal you need to make both sides want it. The opposite is happening.

The Trump administration's strategy appears to be forcing the Palestinians back to negotiations with increasingly punitive measures. Kushner has said as much in recent interviews.

But veteran US diplomats who know the Middle East far better than the 37-year-old son-in-law of the president say that will not work.

Nicholas Burns, who worked as a junior diplomat in Jerusalem before becoming US ambassador to NATO and Greece, told Sky's World View programme this week: "When you cut off all aid to the Palestinians, cut off funds for cancer patients in east Jerusalem, cut of funds for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, this doesn't make sense.

"And if the Trump administration's view is that by cutting off all aid they'll drive the Palestinians to the negotiating table... I think the reverse will happen."

The Trump administration has ended funding for aid for Palestinian refugees after almost seven decades of US support.

It has moved the US embassy to Jerusalem against the protests of Palestinians and recognised the city as Israel's capital even though Palestinians claim it too.

Burns says America is going back on decades of even-handed diplomacy in the region.

"I don't think either party is ready for peace but that doesn't make it smart for the United States to essentially pull the rug out from the Palestinians," he said.

Britain and other European countries are increasingly concerned that US policies are making a two-state solution to the conflict impossible.

The alternative, says Erekat, is a one-state solution where Palestinians are second-class citizens without rights, like black Africans were in South Africa.

"The question to them, these geniuses, is what are you going to do with me? One state, two systems. You plan to achieve apartheid. It's not doable. It's not sustainable."

But if a two-state solution is rendered unworkable by Washington, a one-state solution is the alternative.