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A local committee in Israel last Wednesday approved the development of over 3,500 new settler homes in occupied East Jerusalem, which is expected to create new tensions in the region and further frustrate Washington.
AntiWar.com, citing NGO Peace Now, reported that the homes would be positioned in a way that cuts off East Jerusalem from the southern part of the West Bank. As it stands, the development would create further complications for a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital city, the report said.
A senior diplomatic source in Jerusalem told The Jerusalem Post that the Biden administration has put the concerns of settlements on the “same level as the Iranian nuclear threat.” The source said Americans talk about this issue of settler violence “obsessively.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz in Washington last week and reportedly told him that they should devote as much time as they spend on the Iranian nuclear deal as they do on settlements, which Israeli officials reportedly found “baffling.”
Morton A. Klein, the president of the Zionist Organization of America, wrote a column in The Jerusalem Post in November calling the Biden administration’s attacks “discriminatory and antisemitic.”
TRENDPOST: While Israel calls them “settlements,” they are illegal land grabs under international law. They violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 that states, “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.”
The UN Security Council, the UN General Assembly, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the International Court of Justice, and the High Contracting Parties to the Convention have all affirmed the Fourth Geneva Convention applies, that this is occupied territory, and Israeli settlements there are illegal. (See: “ISRAEL’S NEW ‘SETTLEMENT’ PLAN CONDEMNED BY U.S., EUROPE,” “ISRAEL TO BUILD MORE ‘SETTLEMENTS,’” and “ISRAEL ACCUSED OF APARTHEID BY HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH.”)
TREND FORECAST: Since Neftali Bennett was named prime minister, the Trends Journal predicted that he would bring “more of the same” to the region. (See “ISRAEL’S GOVERNMENT: BOMBS VS. BALLOONS.”)
We reported that Bennett, who will only serve two years as prime minister under the coalition’s arrangement, has indicated that he will take a bellicose approach to Gaza. He said in an interview back in 2018 that if he were the county’s defense minister, he would enact a “shoot-to-kill” policy with Gaza for those who breach the barrier wall.
He was asked what he would do if those breaching the wall were children and he responded that he would kill them, too. “They are not children—they are terrorists,” he said.
Still, Bennett’s coalition has been trying to win over some European friends that his predecessor, Benjamin Netanyahu, a hard-liner, seemed to alienate. The juggling act is hard to do when approving thousands of new settlement units that President Biden said “erode” the hopes of a two-state solution.
The Middle East Eye reported that since Israel took control of East Jerusalem in 1967, its government has not approved the construction of one new neighborhood for Palestinians.
The Biden administration has taken a tougher approach toward Israel and the settlements than the Trump administration. The president has been under increased pressure by the progressive wing of his own party about the U.S.’s relationship with Tel Aviv, which they say comes at the expense of Palestine.
But even with the Biden administration, it seems like more of the same. A source close to Bennett told The Times of Israel that the Biden administration doesn’t care about the new building expansion, and will not prevent future similar moves.
“Contrary to the impression they’re trying to make, the Americans don’t care that much about the Ministry of Construction and Housing’s decision, and they have no problem tolerating it,” the source said, the paper reported.