A leading Israeli settler said he failed to get assurances from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on annexation of the occupied West Bank ahead of a meeting between the premier and US President Donald Trump on Monday.
“Netanyahu listened and the meeting was substantive, but we left troubled despite the open discussion,” said Yossi Dagan, head of the Samaria Regional Council, representing Israeli settlements in northern West Bank.
“In the end the prime minister did not say when sovereignty would come,” Dagan told Israeli news outlet Yedioth Ahronoth.
Dagan flew to New York to meet Netanyahu as part of a delegation from the Yesha council, an umbrella body representing Israeli West Bank settlements.
The meeting on Sunday was held to pressure Netanyahu to insist on annexation during his talks with Trump, where the key issue is expected to be a ceasefire in the Gaza war.
Trump has said he would not allow Israel to extend its sovereignty over the Palestinian territory it has occupied since 1967.
“It’s not going to happen”, the US president said last week.
Trump has indicated that a deal to end the nearly two-year war in Gaza is done and now needs the buy-in of both Israel and Hamas.
Arab leaders, who would be expected to help implement the deal, have repeatedly said that they will not uphold any agreement should Israel move for even partial annexation of the West Bank, as far-right Israeli ministers have demanded.
In his meeting with settler leaders on Sunday, Netanyahu reportedly vowed to raise the issue of annexation with Trump, but stressed that “we must navigate a complex reality,” according to a participant in the meeting quoted by Yedioth Ahronoth.
“This government could be the one that signs on to the creation of a Palestinian state,” Dagan said. “The prime minister can apply sovereignty; that is what we expect of him.”
glp/jd/dcp
© Agence France-Presse
