Mideast expert Caroline Glick praises ‘most significant change to Middle East policy in a decade’

Political analyst and author Caroline Glick lauds U.S. decision that Judean and Samarian communities are not illegal.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

“The announcement by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria are not illegal is the most significant change to U.S. Middle East policy in the last generation,” wrote Caroline Glick in Israel Hayom on Tuesday.

Glick, an author, political analyst, and editor who ran on the New Right ticket in the April Knesset election, placed Monday’s announcement by the Trump administration well above its recognition of the Golan Heights as part of Israel and its embassy move to Jerusalem in its importance to the Jewish State.

This is because the narrative that Jewish communities built in the Jewish homeland contravene legal norms has served as the basis for “incessant condemnation against Israel in international forums and anti-Israeli rulings in international courts,” she wrote.

Glick gave two examples of that which has the potential to be the most damaging to Israel in the long run: the 2016 U.N. Security Council Resolution 2334 that the Obama administration refused to veto, which called the settlements a “flagrant violation of international law” and demanded their removal; and, the fact that the “baseless accusation” regarding settlement activity has “served as grounds for ongoing investigations against Israelis by the International Criminal Court.”

Now, the American public repudiation of this canard that has “defined the world’s hostile discourse” regarding Israel for decades include some “revolutionary arguments,” said Glick.

For one thing, she stated, it sets the record straight in terms of history.

Glick zeroed in on Pompeo’s statement that the administration’s decision was “based on the unique facts, history, and circumstances of the establishment of the West Bank civil settlements,” saying that the American position was “based on the Jewish people’s historic connection to Judea and Samaria, a connection that stands at the heart of the history and identity of the Jewish people.”

She stressed, as well, that the secretary of state noted that the near consensus that the settlements are illegal has not advanced peace between Palestinians and Israelis “even an iota.”

Lastly, she noted, “Pompeo said that in any case, the judicial status of the settlements were irrelevant to peace,” as he said that the conflict was a political issue that had to be decided by negotiations between the two parties.

Glick also praised the timing of the announcement as “a ringing slap in the face to the European Union,” which uses the supposed illegality of the settlements as “justification for its hostile economic and political policies that discriminate against Israel.”

The top EU court last week ordered its member countries not to allow Jewish products made in Judea and Samaria, eastern Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights to be labeled as “made in Israel.”

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