Officials from the previous Donald Trump administration have warned senior Israeli ministers not to assume that the president-elect will support Israel’s annexation of the West Bank during his second term, the Israeli daily reports Times of Israel Tuesday morning.
In recent meetings, Mr. Trump’s former advisers did not rule out the possibility that the president-elect would support the initiative, but they said it should not be seen as an “inevitability,” a daily told the newspaper. Israeli official on condition of anonymity.
The controversial move would face strong resistance from US allies in the Gulf, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, a second Israeli official said. According to this source, Mr. Trump could rely on these countries to achieve more urgent foreign policy objectives, such as combating the Iranian threat, competition with China or ending the war in Ukraine. .
Although Mr. Trump presented a peace plan in 2020 that included Israel’s annexation of all of its settlements, the proposal called for the creation of a Palestinian state in the remaining areas of the West Bank. At the time, Mr. Netanyahu welcomed this proposal with reservation, while the current ultra-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and other representatives of the Israeli extreme right supported it. opposite. After the Palestinian Authority rejected the initiative in 2020, the Trump administration had worked with Israel to plan the partial annexation of the West Bank. Efforts subsequently suspended in exchange for an agreement to normalize ties between the United Arab Emirates and the Jewish state. While Washington’s commitment to Abu Dhabi to block Israeli annexation is set to expire at the end of 2024, the terms of US support for annexation may not change dramatically. “If it happens, it will have to be part of a process,” a former Donald Trump official told Times of Israel.
A similar story from Jason Greenblatt, Donald Trump’s former envoy to the Middle East. “I think it is important for those in Israel celebrating President Trump’s victory to do so because of President Trump’s strong support for Israel, as evidenced by the events of (…) his first term.” . “Some Israeli ministers assume that the extension of Israeli sovereignty in Judea and Samaria is now automatically a done deal and will happen almost as soon as President Trump is sworn in,” he tells the Times of Israel. “I suggest they take a breath. If I were advising these ministers, I would strongly recommend that they first focus on working closely with Prime Minister Netanyahu to enable him to deepen Israel’s relations with the United States and to enable him to work on threats and the considerable challenges Israel faces today. There will be a time to discuss Judea and Samaria, but the context and timing are important,” Greenblatt added.
Officials from the previous Donald Trump administration have warned senior Israeli ministers not to assume that the president-elect will support Israel’s annexation of the West Bank during his second term, Israeli daily Times of Israel reported Tuesday morning .In recent meetings, Mr. Trump’s former advisers have not ruled out…
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