Jerusalem, Israel. Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates led regional states on Monday in condemning Israel’s move to ease settlement expansion and widen its powers in the West Bank, a step critics said went in the direction of annexing occupied land.
Regional and Muslim countries issue condemnation
A joint statement by foreign ministers of Middle Eastern and some other Muslim countries, including Egypt and Turkey, denounced the decisions as a violation of international law that would undermine the vision of a two-state solution as well as stability in the region.
They said the moves were meant to entrench Israeli settlement of the West Bank, displacing Palestinians and imposing unlawful Israeli sovereignty there. Annexing the territory has long been a priority of far-right parties in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition.
Details of Israel’s security cabinet decisions
Sunday’s decisions by Israel’s security cabinet will make it easier for Jewish settlers to buy land in the West Bank and give Israeli authorities more power to act in areas supposedly under full Palestinian control, two senior Israeli ministers said.
One of them, ultranationalist Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, said in announcing the decisions that the government would “continue to kill the idea of a Palestinian state.”
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz and Smotrich issued a joint statement explaining the decisions of the five-member security cabinet, which were not published in full.
The security cabinet decided to repeal a law dating from Jordan’s control of the West Bank before 1967 to make land registries public rather than confidential, and to remove a requirement for a permit from a civil administration office.
Diplomatic relations and broader context
Jordan, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey all have diplomatic relations with Israel. Saudi Arabia has said it will not establish such relations until the formation of a Palestinian state.
Most nations have long backed the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel as the best way to resolve the generations-old conflict and see the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, as the largest part of that future state.
How do you think these Israeli cabinet decisions will affect prospects for a two-state solution?