Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition government, the most right-wing in Israel’s history, is methodically expanding the network of Israeli settlements in the West Bank at a blistering pace, deliberately foreclosing the increasingly remote possibility of a two-state solution with the Palestinians.
This comes as no surprise.
Netanyahu, a champion of settlements, has said that Jews have an “exclusive and inalienable right to all parts of the Land of Israel,” has promised to bolster settlement in the West Bank, and has declared that a Palestinian state would be “an existential danger” to Israel.
Given his hardline views, Netanyahu has surrounded himself with officials who hew to his Zionist Revisionist outlook. One of his advisors, Caroline Glick, believes that Israel should annex the West Bank. And Israel’s new ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter, whom Netanyahu appointed, lived in a West Bank settlement and was a spokesman of the settler movement.
Within Netanyahu’s cabinet are ardent advocates of settlements.
The minister of agriculture and food security, Avi Dichter, told Jewish settlers last week that Israel is approaching a fork in the road. As he put it, “We are at a historic moment that must not be missed. The time has come to apply Israeli sovereignty in Judea and Samaria.”
Orit Strock, the minister of settlement and national projects and a member of Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party, recently expressed delight that Israel has entered a “miracle period” of settlement expansion.
Smotrich, who seeks to annex much of the West Bank and crush the prospects of Palestinian statehood there, has candidly acknowledged that he and his cabinet colleagues are determined to shatter the status quo.
Their campaign to deepen Israel’s occupation and expand its borders is hotly contested by the United Nations.
“Israel’s settlement policy (and) its acts of annexation … violate Palestinians’ right to self-determination,” Volker Türk, the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, said recently.
Israel is creating facts on the ground in the West Bank as it confronts its enemies on several fronts.
Israel is still enmeshed in a war with Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip. Israel is attacking Hezbollah sites in Lebanon, claiming that the pro-Iranian Lebanese militia is violating last November’s ceasefire. Israel is caught up in clashes with pro-Hamas Palestinian guerrillas in the West Bank. Israel is fending off Houthi missile and drone attacks. And in the wake of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s downfall last December, Israel is building a buffer zone in southern Syria, much to the outrage of the new government in Damascus.
These developments were of little or no concern to Smotrich when he boldly outlined his annexationist position on X a few days ago.
“Instead of hiding and apologizing, we are raising the flag, building and settling,” he wrote. And in a direct reference to the Israeli cabinet’s recent decision to convert 13 “neighborhoods” in existing West Bank settlements into 13 full-fledged settlements, he said, “We are continuing to lead a revolution in the normalization and formalization of settlements. This is another important step on the way to de facto (Israeli) sovereignty in Judea and Samaria.”
The government’s decision to upgrade the status of these “neighborhoods” means they can “advance and develop” as outright settlements, said Smotrich, who heads the newly established Settlement Administration. Previously known as the Civil Administration, it was formerly under the direction of the Israeli army.
The “neighborhoods” that have been transformed into “settlements” are: Neriya, Haresha, Alon, Kerem Reim, Migron, Shvut Rachel, Ovnat, Leshem, Brosh Habika, Nofei Nehemia, Gvaot, Ibei Hanahal and Tal Menashe.
Israel’s drive to tighten its grip on the West Bank, which is inhabited by about three million Palestinians and almost 500,000 Israeli Jews in 145 settlements and upwards of 200 outposts, has been rigorously documented by Peace Now, an organization that opposes settlements. In its annual review of settlement activity, which was released earlier this month, Peace Now reported that a record number of illegal outposts were established last year.
According to Peace Now, 59 unauthorized and illegal outposts have been created of late, more “state land” has been allocated to Jewish settlers in the West Bank for residential, commercial and agricultural use, and authorized settlements have received increased funding.
Eight of these outposts are in Area B, which is under the civil rather than the security control of the Palestinian Authority. Peace Now regards Israel’s moves as an attempt to undermine the PA.
As well, Israel has paved some 114 kilometers of roads to facilitate the establishment of new outposts and the seizure of additional land in the West Bank.
In a report issued last year, Peace Now said that the Higher Planning Committee, a government body, had advanced plans for building 8,681 housing units in existing settlements. During the same period, Israel converted five outposts — Evyatar, Givat Assaf, Sde Efrayim, Adorayim, and Nahal Heletz — into settlements.
Israel’s policy in the West Bank is endorsed by most Republican Party politicians in the United States.
Last month, a group of Republicans in the Senate and the House of Representatives introduced bills that would prohibit the words “West Bank” in U.S. government documents and materials and replace them with the term “Judea and Samaria.”
The legislation is designed to support Israel’s claim to the West Bank, which was captured from Jordan during the 1967 Six Day War.
Evangelical leaders in the United States such as Ralph Reed, Terri Copeland Pearsons and Tony Perkins regard themselves as Christian Zionists and have been pressing President Donald Trump to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank.
“We Christians are calling on our beloved President Trump and his team to aggressively remove all barriers to Israel’s sovereignty over all the land, including Judea and Samaria,” said Pearsons.
Mike Huckabee, Trump’s ambassador designate to Israel, agrees with their view. He has said that “settlements” are “neighborhoods” and that “there is no such thing as the West Bank or an occupation.”
Trump may be sympathetic to their ideas. During his first term of office, he recognized Israel’s sovereignty of the Golan Heights and rejected the notion that settlements contravene international law.
On his first day as president in January, he signed an executive order reversing the Biden administration’s sanctions against a group of radical Israeli settlers in the West Bank.
And last month, prior to his meeting with Netanyahu at the White House, Trump said that Israel is a “small country,” suggesting he may be receptive to Israel’s partial annexation of the West Bank.
In 2020, he backed Israel’s annexation of the Jordan Valley.
Itamar Ben Gvir, the minister of national security and a proponent of settlements, appears confident that the Trump administration will endorse the principle and practice of annexation.
Shortly after Trump’s inauguration, he invoked an endearing passage from the Hollywood movie Casablanca when he wrote on X, “Donald, this looks like the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
It may well be, much to the detriment of Palestinian national aspirations.