The decision – which was also announced at the White House – was an immediate response to reports that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government was planning further settlement expansion, according to a US official, one of several who discussed the decision on the condition of anonymity according to the rules of administration.
Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced plans Thursday evening to approve the construction of 3,000 new homes in the settlements after Israeli police said Palestinian gunmen opened fire near the existing settlement of Maale Adumim, killing one Israeli and injuring five others. The expansion plans, he said, were part of “deepening our eternal hold over the entire Land of Israel.”
“It’s outrageous” after all the U.S. support the Israeli government has received in recent months, a former Biden official said. “For Smotrich to go and do that, it’s just a F-you.”
US officials said the decision to clarify Washington’s position on the settlements had already been studied and planned as part of recent moves intended to express the administration’s growing unease with Israeli actions in Gaza and the West Bank – to start by visa restrictions announced in December against settlers who have used violence and undermined security in the West Bank.
In February, President Biden published a decree authorizing financial sanctions against four named settlersfollowed a week later by a national security memorandum reminding recipients of American weapons of the need to comply with American and international law.
White House spokesman John Kirby, minutes after Blinken’s remarks in Argentina, told reporters in Washington that the decision to declare the settlements illegal puts the Biden administration in line with previous U.S. administrations — to the exception of Trump’s.
“We simply reaffirm the fundamental conclusion that these settlements are incompatible with international law,” he said. “It’s a position that has been consistent across a series of Republican and Democratic administrations: if there’s one administration that’s inconsistent, it’s the previous one.”
The declaration that Israeli settlements in the occupied territories are illegal returns US policy to where it has been since 1978, when a State Department legal opinion declared them “incompatible with international law.” This opinion, published during the Carter administration, affirmed that “a territory coming under the control of a belligerent occupier does not thereby become its sovereign territory.”
At the time, there were approximately 75 Israeli settlements in Gaza and the West Bank. There are now at least 146 settlements authorized by the Israeli government in the West Bank, not including East Jerusalem, as well as 144 that are not officially recognized, according to Peace Now, an Israeli organization that advocates a two-state solution.
The 1978 policy has been maintained under all subsequent administrations, although many have preferred euphemisms such as saying that the settlements were an “obstacle to peace”. In 2005, Israel withdrew its settlements from Gaza.
In 2019, however, Trump Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the United States no longer considered the settlements a violation of international law, although he never ordered the issuance of a new judicial advice.
Under an unrealized Trump peace plan, Israel would have been granted sovereignty over all existing settlements and allowed to annex up to 30 percent of the West Bank. During his 2020 presidential campaign, Biden said his policies would be based on his commitment to a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine, but did not commit to reversing Trump’s actions, notably the moving of the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and the recognition of the annexation of Israel. Golan Heights from Syria.
During his first visit to Israel as secretary of state in May 2021, Blinken said the Biden administration opposed “any measures” – including new settlements – that risked “triggering violence” or undermined “the prospect of a return to the pursuit of two states.” Much of the new construction undertaken and proposed by the Netanyahu government involves the expansion of existing settlements.
In February last year, a joint declaration released by American, Palestinian, Israeli, Egyptian and Jordanian officials following a summit in the Jordanian city of Aqaba, Israel pledged to “stop discussions on any new settlement units for four months and to suspend the authorization of any outpost for six months.” »
But immediately afterward, Smotrich announced that “there would be no freeze on construction and development, not even for one day.”
Violence has increased exponentially in the West Bank, where at least 700,000 Israeli settlers now live, since October 7. Hamas attacks in southern Israel that killed around 1,200 Israelis. This triggered ongoing Israeli military operations in Gaza, where nearly 30,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza health authorities.
Since the start of the war, according to the United Nations, 399 Palestinians have been killed in conflict-related incidents in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, including 102 children, and 4,545 Palestinians have been injured, including 702 children.
During the same period, 13 Israelis, including four members of the Israeli army, were killed and 86 injured.
The Biden administration “has done its best not to get involved in all of this,” calling the settlements “unnecessary,” said Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of J-Street, a liberal policy group on Israel issues -Palestinians. “The last four and a half months show that this is not a problem you can ignore. It’s going to explode if you don’t do anything. »
DeYoung reported from Washington.
