Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, right, and secretary general of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Saeb Erekat, attend the opening of the 30th Arab Summit in Tunis, Tunisia, March 31, 2019. (AP/Fethi Belaid)
At Arab League summit, Palestinian Authority president says U.S. giving Israel green light to annex parts of Judea, Samaria.
By Deborah Fineblum, World Israel News
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas warned fellow Arab leaders at the 30th Arab League summit in Tunis that the United States will allow Israel to annex part of Judea and Samaria. Abbas didn’t give a time frame for the expected annexation.
Abbas made his remarks in light of U.S. President Donald Trump’s formal recognition of Israeli control of the Golan Heights, which it won in the 1967 Six Day War. Israel annexed the Heights in 1981.
Abbas made clear his unhappiness with Trump’s Golan recognition, saying the U.S. “illegitimately announced its recognition of Israel annexing the occupied Syrian Golan… which we and the whole world reject.”
“What is coming from the United States is even more dangerous,” Abbas said. “It will tell Israel: ‘Annex part of the Palestinian land, give what remains of it self-rule and grant the Gaza Strip a nominal state for Hamas to play with.’”
Abbas opposes the separation of the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip from PA-controlled areas in Judea and Samaria as he considers both areas part of a single political entity that should be under PA control.
The Palestinian leader spoke in advance of the anticipated roll out of what U.S. President Donald Trump is calling the “Deal of the Century” to resolve the Israeli-Arab conflict.
“The U.S. administration’s decision is to destroy the Arab peace plan and constitutes a dramatic change from the positions of previous U.S. administrations,” Abbas said.
After the Six Day War, the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution barring “the acquisition of territory by war” as it related to territory Israel captured in 1967. The resolution called for Israel’s withdrawal “from territories occupied in the recent conflict.”
The Trump administration’s recognition of Israeli authority over the Golan pushed back at that U.N. resolution.
Annexation of at least parts of Judea and Samaria is a position that some Israeli political parties competing in the April election promote. The New Right, led by Education Minister Naftali Bennett and Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, advocates extending Israeli control over “Area C” in those territories.
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