judea and samaria

Jewish groups react to new ‘settlement’ policy

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Jewish and Israel-related groups quickly reacted to the announcement by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that the U.S. would no longer view Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria as illegal under international law.

“We thank Secretary Pompeo and the Trump administration for righting this wrong impression left by some prior administrations that improperly classified these Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria,” said Orthodox Union President Moishe Bane.

OU Executive Direct for Public Policy Nathan Diament added that the announcement “serves as a testament to the United States’ support of Israel, its most important ally in the Middle East.”
The ZOA lauded Pompeo for “rescinding the Orwellian, anti-Semitic lie that Jews can’t legally build in Judea-Samaria, while Arabs can,” the organization’s president, Mort Klein, told JNS. “There was never an Arab country called Palestine — no Palestinian Arab kings and queens.”

He added that “Jewish communities there comprise less than 2 percent of all of Judea-Samaria. The fact that the Arabs have rejected statehood offers three times in the last 19 years proves the Arab war against Israel is not about ‘settlements,’ but a rejection of Israel’s existence within any borders.”

IsB’nai B’rith International CEO Daniel Mariaschin said, “We applaud the administration’s decision to rescind the assertion that Israeli settlements are illegal under international law. U.N. resolutions 242 and 338 laid the groundwork for a solution to the Middle East conflict in which the parties would negotiate directly with each other over land, rather than return to 1949 or 1967 boundaries that were neither secure nor mutually recognized. The false characterization of Israel’s presence in parts of the West Bank as ‘illegal’ only prejudged the outcome of future negotiations and was an impediment to the peace process.”

Republican Jewish Coalition executive director Matt Brooks tweeted, “@realDonaldTrump THANK YOU for your decision to reverse US policy regarding #Israel settlements. You are the MOST PRO ISRAEL PRESIDENT in history.”

Sarah Stern, founder and president of the Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET), told JNS that “what has stood at the very core of the problem of the lack of progress towards peace is the Palestinian reluctance to recognize any border, even the 1948 border, or the 1949 armistice lines, as legitimate and the failure on the part of the Palestinians to recognize the existence of a Jewish state, anywhere. That is why, to this very day, their textbooks show that all of Israel, even within the pre-1967 borders, is ‘Palestine’.”

Women in Green said “the Sovereignty movement” welcomes the declaration.

“The words of the American president faithfully express the historical truth and international law which states that Judea and Samaria are part of the territory designated for the establishment of a Jewish home for the Jewish people.”

Israel-Jewish Congress President Vladimir Sloutsker praised the administration “for showing the moral clarity and having the courage to speak the basic truth, in recognizing the communities in Judea and Samaria are not illegal.”

Former Boro Park Assemblyman Dov Hikind, founder of Americans Against Antisemitism, said, “Thank you President Trump for being courageous.”

“Israelis living in Judea and Samaria has never been illegal and we’re happy that the Trump administration has recognized this salient fact,” Hikind said.

On the left, J Street panned Pompeo’s announcement, calling the move an obstacle to peace.

“With their actions and rhetoric, the president and his advisers have given the Israeli government carte blanche to expand settlements, entrench occupation and move towards formal annexation of the West Bank,” said J Street president Jeremy Ben-Ami in a statement. “By discarding decades of bipartisan U.S. policy and flagrantly disregarding international law, they are trampling on the rights of Palestinians and helping the Israeli right-wing to destroy Israel’s future as a democratic homeland for the Jewish people.”

Finally, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee issued a neutral statement.

“AIPAC does not take a position on settlements. We believe settlements should be an issue for direct negotiations between the parties, not something determined by international bodies. The Palestinians must stop their boycott of US & Israeli officials and return to direct talks,” tweeted AIPAC.