Proper-wing figures in Israel rejected US President Donald Trump’s declaration Thursday that Israeli annexation of the West Financial institution is “not going to happen,” and known as on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to take the step anyway.
The premier’s allies, a lot of whom have lengthy supported annexing the West Financial institution, have pushed him in latest weeks to declare Israeli sovereignty over components of the territory as a response to the wave of Western nations asserting their recognition of a Palestinian state.
“The Jewish individuals’s sovereignty over the Jewish homeland doesn’t depend upon any exterior supply. Even one as loving and pleasant as will be,” MK Zvi Sukkot, of the far-right Spiritual Zionism occasion, wrote on X, with out mentioning Trump by title.
“Confronted with European nations’ insane recognition of a Palestinian terror state, we should apply sovereignty [over the West Bank] already throughout this time period,” he added.
Likud MK Dan Ilouz mentioned the matter “is solely the choice of the Jewish individuals.”
“We love and recognize President Trump for standing alongside Israel through the years,” Ilouz tweeted. “However the State of Israel is a sovereign nation.”
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich gestures towards a map of the West Financial institution throughout a press convention on the Finance Ministry in Jerusalem, September 3, 2025. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
“No worldwide determine, even an excellent and beloved buddy, can dictate to us the way to relate to our land,” he mentioned.
MK Avi Maoz, the one lawmaker within the Knesset from the far-right, anti-gay Noam occasion, mentioned that “with all due respect” to the US, “the choice to use sovereignty lies with the Israeli authorities and Knesset.”
Yossi Dagan, who heads the Samaria Regional Council of settlements within the northern West Financial institution, mentioned Friday that “a sympathetic American administration isn’t one that may apply sovereignty or construct rather than us, it’s an administration that we will handle our agreements and handle our disagreements with.”
Dagan insisted that, after the Hamas terror group’s October 7, 2023, assault on Israel, the nation is not going to quit on annexing the West Financial institution, as a way to forestall a Palestinian state that he has mentioned would pose an existential risk to the Jewish state.
“Solely sovereignty over all of the open areas and settlements will forestall a terror state within the coronary heart of Israel,” Dagan mentioned.
Most proposals for West Financial institution annexation — together with people who would see Israel declare a big majority of the territory’s space and stop any contiguous Palestinian state — avoid major Palestinian population centers.
Shomron Regional Council head Yossi Dagan, left, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, proper, on the Knesset, in Jerusalem on December 11, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
“The accountability is Netanyahu’s. He’s prime minister, we elected him, and he ought to declare on the UN: That is our land, I’ll do what’s vital for Israel’s continued existence after October 7, and apply full sovereignty to Judea and Samaria,” Dagan mentioned, utilizing a Biblical time period for the West Financial institution.
“Nearly all of the nation expects this, the vast majority of the nation is not going to quit on this,” Dagan mentioned.
Trump informed reporters on the White Home on Thursday that “I can’t permit Israel to annex the West Financial institution. I can’t permit it. It’s not going to occur.”
He made the feedback as Netanyahu was arriving in New York to ship an tackle to the United Nations, forward of a gathering slated for subsequent week between the leaders on the White Home.
A senior Israeli official informed The Instances of Israel earlier this week that the Trump administration privately cautioned Israel in opposition to annexing the West Financial institution in response to the latest choices by Western nations to acknowledge Palestinian statehood.
Nonetheless, Jerusalem didn’t really feel that the warning marked “an finish to the dialogue,” and Netanyahu deliberate to debate the matter with Trump throughout their assembly subsequent week, the Israeli official mentioned.
With out US help, Israel is way much less more likely to go forward with the transfer, which might have diminished significance with out backing from the world’s main superpower and would spark massive international backlash.
