by JNS
“The fact that a diplomatic attack on Israel is met with Israeli silence—is unacceptable and cannot continue,” said Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
Israeli ministers on Saturday night called on the government to annex Judea and Samaria, after the U.N. General Assembly voted to adopt the so-called New York Declaration on the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine, which outlines the implementation of a two-state solution and the path towards recognition of a Palestinian state.
“The fact that a diplomatic attack on Israel is met with Israeli silence—is unacceptable and cannot continue,” said Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who is also a minister in the Defense Ministry responsible for overseeing civilian issues related to Judea and Samaria.
“France and other countries are openly acting against Israel. Israel must apply Israeli sovereignty as a preventive measure against the reckless attempt to establish a terror state in the heart of our land,” he added.
Israeli Justice Minister Yariv Levin called the U.N. decision “a reward for terrorism,” adding that a Palestinian state will never be established.
“The Land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel,” he added. “Even the U.N. decision will not change that. It is time to apply sovereignty to Judea, Samaria and the Jordan Valley. This is the appropriate Zionist response.”
Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu said the U.N. had transformed from an organization that recognized the Jews’ right to a state in 1947 into “a circus that rewards murderers.”
“An organization in which 57 Muslim countries and African dictatorships have an automatic majority is not only irrelevant, it is dangerous,” he said. “Its resolutions have no meaning, and the time has come for President Trump to lead to its replacement with a sane alternative.
“No invented state will arise for an invented people,” he continued. “There has never been a Palestinian state and there never will be.”
On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attended the signing of an “umbrella agreement” between the government and Ma’ale Adumim at the Judean city’s Cultural Center, which commits Jerusalem to finance the construction of two new neighborhoods and the expansion of a third in the city.
“We said there will be no Palestinian state—indeed there will be no Palestinian state. This place is ours,” Netanyahu declared at the event.
In repudiating a Palestinian state, Netanyahu referred to the most strategically important part of the agreement—the building of a new neighborhood in E1 (“East 1”)—an area, once built, both Israel and the Palestinians agree threatens Arab geographic contiguity, making it far more difficult to establish a viable Palestinian state.
Various obstacles, chief among them international pressure, have left E1, a 12-square-kilometer (4.6 sq. mile) area in Judea, virtually untouched for decades, despite support for construction by every Israeli government starting from Yitzhak Rabin’s in 1994, which first proposed the idea.
Other ministers who attended were Environmental Protection Minister Idit Silman, Education Minister Yoav Kisch, Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism Minister Amichai Chikli, Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi, and Ze’ev Elkin, a minister in the Finance Ministry.
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee said last week that Washington had “never asked Israel not to apply sovereignty” in Judea and Samaria.
“I have repeatedly said that the United States respects Israel as a sovereign state and will not tell Israel what to do. That’s also what Secretary of State Rubio said just last week,” Channel 14 quoted the American envoy as saying.
Asked by reporters to comment on this development, Rubio said, “What you’re seeing with [Judea and Samaria] and the annexation, that’s not a final thing—that’s something being discussed among some elements of Israeli politics. I’m not going to opine on that today.”
He went on to say that Washington had harsh words for world leaders who have said that they plan to recognize an independent Palestinian state.
“We told all these countries, ‘If you guys do this recognition stuff—it’s all fake, it’s not even real,” Rubio said. “If you do it, you’re going to create really big problems.”
Rubio is scheduled to arrive in Israel on Sept. 14 for an official visit. Tommy Pigott, principal deputy spokesperson for the State Department, stated on Friday that Rubio “will convey America’s priorities in the Israel-Hamas conflict and broader issues concerning Middle Eastern security, reaffirming U.S. commitment to Israeli security.”
JNS
Source: https://www.jns.org/israeli-ministers-call-for-annexation-after-un-vote-on-palestine/
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