Far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said Israel was "here to stay" during a tour of the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, defending Israeli settlements in the territory despite their illegality under international law.
Both Smotrich and Defense Minister Israel Katz, who accompanied him, denounced what they called "illegal" construction by Palestinians as the main challenge to Israeli expansion in the West Bank, which a UN court has said it is obliged to halt.
"Judea and Samaria," Smotrich said, employing the Biblical name Israel uses for the West Bank, are "the cradle of our homeland, the land of the Bible. We are here to stay."
He noted that 2024 had been a "record" year for demolitions of Palestinian constructions that Israel deems illegal.
"The Israeli government is working to develop the settlements in Judea and Samaria and will not allow the unchecked illegal Arab construction that has become a national plague in recent decades," he said, adding settlers "are not second-class citizens" and are entitled to Israeli security guarantees.
In a video statement filmed alongside Smotrich, Katz added that Israel will prevent "any attempt by the PA (Palestinian Authority) to take control of Judea and Samaria and harm Jewish settlements."
The Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority was created in the 1990s and meant as a temporary Palestinian government until the creation of a sovereign state. It exercises limited self-rule in parts of the West Bank.
Israeli politicians, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have on several occasions rejected the idea of a sovereign Palestinian state in recent months.
Smotrich said in November that 2025 would be the year Israel extends its sovereignty over settlements in the West Bank, which it has occupied since 1967.
On Tuesday, he extolled the building of new settlements as a "strategic tool" to achieve a "revolution" in controlling the territory.
Smotrich, himself a settler, pointed to the fact that Netanyahu's government, one of the most right-wing in Israel's history, has approved 28 new settlements since its establishment.
Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal under international law.
The UN's International Court of Justice issued a non-binding opinion last year that found Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories illegal, saying it had an "obligation to bring to an end its unlawful presence as rapidly as possible," halt any new settlements and evacuate existing ones.
Netanyahu at the time dismissed the opinion as a "decision of lies."
AFP
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