US envoy defends Israel’s ‘right’ to annex West Bank land: NYTimes

AP Photo/Ariel Schalit

US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman speaks during the 5th trilateral summit between Israel, Greece and Cyprus in Beersheba, Israel, Thursday, Dec. 20, 2018.

‘There were some extraordinarily generous proposals made to Palestinians that they turned down,’ Friedman said

In an interview with the New York Times published on Saturday, US ambassador to Israel David Friedman defended Israel’s right to annex most of the West Bank, as he laid the brunt of the blame for the deadlock in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on the Palestinian Authority (PA).

“Under certain circumstances, I think Israel has the right to retain some, but unlikely all, of the West Bank,” Friedman reportedly said, which is likely to deepen the controversy and chasm between US President Donald Trump’s administration and the Palestinians.

Senior Palestinian official Saeb Erekat has unequivocally stated that any policy allowing for annexation of territories in the West Bank would amount to “US complicity with Israeli colonial plans.”

“The Palestinian leadership is really the difficulty right now,” Friedman stated, claiming that if not for the PA and social pressures, Palestinians would jump at the American peace proposal, which would start with businessmen attending the Bahrain economic conference to be held later this month.

“I know firsthand, they want to come,” he said of Palestinian businessmen who he argued are under “massive pressure” not to attend what he described as “an attempt to give life to their aspirations by creating a viable economy.”

Friedman, an ardent supporter of the Israeli settlements that are largely viewed as violating international law, told the Times that the Trump plan was intended to improve the quality of life for Palestinians but would fall well short of a “permanent resolution to the conflict.”

Following persistent expansion of the settlements by successive Netanyahu governments, more than 600,000 Jewish settlers now live in the West Bank, including annexed east Jerusalem, among some three million Palestinians.

“There were some extraordinarily generous proposals made to the Palestinians that they turned down,” Friedman charged.

He nevertheless seemed unconcerned with delays to the peace proposal, partially owed to Israel’s drawn out national elections, declaring that “the right plan, for the right time, will get the right reaction over time.”