Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted on Sunday that he would not accept a Palestinian state as he sought to placate far-right allies before a UN vote on the issue.
“Our opposition to a Palestinian state in any territory west of the Jordan [River], this opposition is existing, valid, and has not changed one bit,” Mr Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting.
Mr Netanyahu's comments came two days after Israel's most significant ally, the US, put forward a draft UN resolution on the Gaza peace process that included, for the first time, a reference to Palestinian statehood. That point infuriated prominent figures on Israel's far right, testing Mr Netanyahu's awkward governing coalition of conservatives and ultra-nationalists.
On Saturday, far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich called on Mr Netanyahu to denounce the idea of a Palestinian state. Mr Ben-Gvir threatened to leave the governing coalition if the Prime Minister did not act.
Seeking to shore up the government's position, the Defence Minister, Israel Katz, and the Foreign Minister, Gideon Saar, also issued statements on X against a Palestinian state on Sunday. “Israel's policy is clear: no Palestinian state will be established,” Mr Katz said.
In a separate statement, Mr Saar said: “Israel will not agree to the establishment of a Palestinian terror state in the heart of the Land of Israel, at a negligible distance from all its population centres and with topographical control over them.”
Mr Netanyahu said that he has been rebuffing attempts to establish a Palestinian state for decades and that he is “doing it both against pressures from outside and against pressures from within. So, I do not need affirmations, tweets or lectures from anyone,” he said. Mr Netanyahu also said that “Gaza will be demilitarised, and Hamas will be disarmed”.
“Either this will happen the easy way or it will happen the hard way. This is what I said, and this is what President Trump also said,” he added.
Mr Trump's Gaza plan, which came into effect on October 10, ended serious fighting between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas after two years of war that devastated the Palestinian enclave and triggered spillover conflicts across the Middle East.
The 15-member UN Security Council is holding negotiations on the draft, which would enact Mr Trump's proposal for a “Board of Peace” and a transitional administration in Gaza to address issues including postwar reconstruction and economic recovery. A vote is expected on Monday.
The latest says that after a reform programme for the Palestinian Authority “is faithfully carried out and Gaza redevelopment has advanced, the conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood”.
It also commits Washington to “establish a dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians to agree on a political horizon for peaceful and prosperous coexistence”.
