Vance rebukes Israel on 'very stupid' vote to annex West Bank
Vice President JD Vance said Thursday that a vote by Israeli lawmakers to annex the West Bank was a "very stupid political stunt."
A bill applying Israeli law to the occupied West Bank, which effectively would annex the territory for Israel, passed a vote Wednesday in Israel’s parliament as Vance was visiting the country, according to Reuters. It was the first of four votes needed for the proposal to become law. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud Party did not back the legislation, which was pushed by lawmakers outside his ruling coalition, the news agency added.
"That was weird. I was sort of confused by that," Vance told reporters on Thursday when asked about the vote. "Now I actually asked somebody about it, and they told me that it was a symbolic vote, some symbolic vote to recognize or a symbolic vote to annex the West Bank. I mean, what I would say to that is when I asked about it, somebody told me it was a political stunt, that it had no practical significance, it was purely symbolic."
"I mean look, if it was a political stunt, it was a very stupid political stunt, and I personally take some insult to it. The West Bank is not going to be annexed by Israel," Vance added. "The policy of the Trump administration is that the West Bank will not be annexed by Israel. That will continue to be our policy. And if people want to take symbolic votes, they can do that, but we certainly weren't happy about it."
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Following Vance's comments, a top member of Netanyahu's Likud Party announced Thursday that the Israeli prime minister told him not to advance proposals regarding the annexation of the West Bank, according to Israeli media.
"The Knesset vote on annexation was a deliberate political provocation by the opposition to sow discord during Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Israel. The two bills were sponsored by opposition members of the Knesset," Netanyahu's office wrote on X.
"The Likud party and the religious parties (the principal coalition members) did not vote for these bills, except for one disgruntled Likud member who was recently fired from the chairmanship of a Knesset committee. Without Likud support, these bills are unlikely to go anywhere," it added.
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Possible annexation of the West Bank has been floated in Israel in response to a string of countries moving to recognize a Palestinian state, according to The Associated Press.
Israel captured the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories to form their future state. They, and much of the international community, say annexation would all but end any remaining possibility of a two-state solution, the AP reported.
More than half a million Jewish settlers now live in the West Bank in some 130 settlements.
"I will not allow Israel to annex the West Bank," President Donald Trump said in late September in the Oval Office. "I will not allow it. It’s not going to happen."
The deputy Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, Majed Bamya, told the U.N. Security Council on Thursday that Palestinians "appreciate the clear message" the Trump administration has sent in opposition to annexation.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
