Response to Trump Declaring Israel West Bank Settlements No Longer Illegal
On Monday, Nov. 18, the Trump Administration announced that the US would no longer consider Israeli settlement activity
in the West Bank illegal, despite decades of US statements insisting that it was in fact illegal.
Strongly denouncing the U.S. policy shift, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, one of the leading candidates in
the Democratic Party's presidential primary, said: “Another blatantly ideological attempt by the Trump administration to
distract from its failures in the region. Not only do these settlements violate international law—they make peace harder
to achieve. As president, I will reverse this policy and pursue a two state solution.”
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, another prominent Democratic candidate, said that “Israeli settlements in occupied territory are illegal. This is
clear from international law and multiple United Nations resolutions. Once again, Mr. Trump is isolating the United
States and undermining diplomacy by pandering to his extremist base.”
Warren and Sanders are considered the most critical of Israel among Democratic presidential contenders.
Also rebuking the move, Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend and a leading Democratic presidential hopeful, said that
"the Trump administration’s statement on West Bank settlements is not only a significant step backward in our efforts to
achieve a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is the latest in a pattern of destructive decisions
that harm our national interests."
Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), the senior Democrat on the Senate's Intelligence Committee, warned that "the Trump
administration's decision to reverse longstanding U.S. policy and unilaterally legitimize Israeli settlements in the
West Bank serves no strategic purpose except to further undermine the chances for a lasting and peaceful two-state
solution."
Rep. Alan Lowenthal (D-CA) called the decision “outrageous” and urged fellow members of Congress to pass a resolution in
favor of the two-state solution for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Lowenthal also warned of possible future steps taken by the Israeli government to annex parts of the West Bank in light
of the American new settlement policy.
This is one of many moves by the Trump Administration to strengthen right-wing Jewish support for his presidency, hoping
to overcome the growing recognition by many Jews that Trump's legitimation of right-wing white-nationalist extremists
has created a political atmosphere in which antiSemitism is growing in the U.S. and around the world. There are some
Jews who will bite at this bait, believing that giving in to Israel's expansionist policies will somehow provide more
security. The truth is the opposite--that the settlers have intensified hatreds between West Bank settlers and those
Palestinians who have held up hope that someday they could have a politically and economically viable state of their
own, rather than a series of isolated Palestinian cities in a countryside that was increasingly dominated by Jewish
religious extremists.
From our standpoint at Tikkun, this recent development and the likelihood that they will be followed by acts to annex to Israel West Bank settlements
only strengthens our view that this is a time for Jews and our allies to rally around Tikkun's call for "one person one vote" for anyone living under Israeli rule, including the West Bank and Gaza. The call for
one person one vote resonates with people all around the world as well as in Israel and the U.S. It should be evident to
many today that describing the settlement of the West Bank as illegal under international law did not have much teeth in
terms of pushing Israel in a different direction. When I was in Israel most recently, even the most progressive
activists laughed with bitterness at "international law" which has been broken so often by so many countries (including
the U.S., China, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, and the list goes on and on). On the other hand, many
Israelis and Jews in the US do have an attachment to the democratic ideal expressed in "one person one vote." It's time
for progressives to reframe what we want.
How could this be an effective long-term strategy, rather than those that seek economic and political ways to coerce
Israel into ethical behavior? If support for this strategy grows, as I think it will if the peace forces in Israel,
Palestine, Western Europe and the US enthusiastically use it as the center of their discourse, right wingers in Israel
may start to feel that this kind of a movement demand might eventually be imposed on Israel. Rather than wait for that
to happen, many of them would begin to feel that the creation of a Palestinian state is far less dangerous to the Jewish
people than what would become a binational state imposed on them. At that point, perhaps a decade or two away, Israel
might embrace the 2 state solution as their way of maintaining a Jewish state. There is, of course, nothing inevitable
about this possible scenario, but it seems more plausible than a strategy based on somehow hoping that international law
will be enforced on Israel or that economic boycotts will cause deep economic costs on Israel and that Israel will be
willing to adopt a one-state solution.
In any event, we at Tikkun stand with all those who condemn the Trump Administration's latest outrage, just as we stood with those who were
outraged at 8 years of the Obama Administration's empty proclamations of criticism of Israel policy while simultaneously
vetoing every single UN resolution calling for changes in Israeli policy toward Palestinians (except the very last one
which Obama supported AFTER the 2016 election when it was obvious that nothing he did or said then in the last two
months of his presidency would have any lasting impact on the region). Obama last weekend warned Democrats to not be too
responsive to the young people who have been insisting on substantial changes in America's economy and health care
program. Yet after 8 years of his moderation, a substantial part of the American people were willing to elect Trump
(aided by an electoral college system that Obama had taken no serious moves to build a constituency to replace with a
constitutional amendment abolishing the Electoral College). The last thing this country needs now is another Obama-style
Democrat who will be a servant of the ruling elites of this country while making largely token gestures to address the
needs of the rest of us. But how to get a more effective progressive movement is a central part of my new book Revolutionary Love, which I hope you will read and get others to read (info about the book and how to order it at www.tikkun.org/lj).
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