Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister and staunch backer of the illegal settler movement, said on 30 December that Washington has given Tel Aviv “full support” to expand settlements in the occupied West Bank in violation of international law.
“The US administration is giving us full support to expand settlements in the West Bank in order to undermine the establishment of a Palestinian state,” Smotrich said.
The statement coincided with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the US and came after a meeting between Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump.
“We have had a discussion, big discussion for a long time on the West Bank. And I wouldn’t say we agree on the West Bank 100 percent, but we’ll come to a conclusion on the West Bank,” Trump said after the meeting.
When asked by reporters what the disagreement was about, Trump said, “I don’t want to do that, it will be announced at an appropriate time.”
Netanyahu “will do the right thing,” the US president went on to say.
Since coming to power in late 2022, Netanyahu’s government has been rapidly advancing Israel’s longstanding goal of annexing the West Bank, which was occupied illegally during the 1967 war.
New illegal settlements are being established at an accelerated rate, and the Knesset has approved a bill calling to impose Israeli “sovereignty” over the territory.
Trump recently claimed that he would “not allow” Israel to annex the occupied West Bank.
“Trump and his top advisors asked Netanyahu to change Israel’s policies in the occupied West Bank during their meeting on Monday,” informed sources told Axios on 30 December.
“The White House thinks a violent escalation in the West Bank would undermine efforts to implement the Gaza peace agreement and prevent the expansion of the Abraham Accords before the end of Trump’s term,” the sources went on to say, adding that the US president’s team asked the Israelis to “calm things down.”
“The president and his team raised settler violence against Palestinian civilians, the financial instability of the Palestinian Authority, and Israeli settlements expansion. Netanyahu spoke very strongly against settler violence and said he is going to take more action,” the sources said.
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