‘Netanyahu succeeding with corona, but failing at sovereignty,’ Samaria council head says

“The U.S. president is up to his neck in issues related to coronavirus and is also preparing for elections in November. There is no more fitting time than now,” Dagan said.

By David Isaac, World Israel News

Samaria Regional Council Head Yossi Dagan, who recently called for the establishment of a ‘Sovereignty Czar,’ the same way a ‘Corona Czar’ was just established, says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is letting a historic opportunity slip away.

Israel has put its sovereignty plans on hold at least indirectly due to the global corona pandemic. The Netanyahu government says it wants to coordinate its moves tightly with the U.S. administration. However, the U.S. is focused on battling corona and has put Arab-Israeli issues on the back burner.

Dagan argues it’s precisely because of the distraction of corona that Israel should act now.

“All governments are now engaged in eradicating the coronavirus and the last thing they will deal with is the application of sovereignty here in Judea and Samaria,” he said.

“The U.S. president is up to his neck in issues related to coronavirus and is also preparing for elections in November. There is no more fitting time than now,” Dagan said.

“I call on the prime minister to apply sovereignty here and now. No more talk and certainly no more election promises,” he added.

Unlike some other local settlement leaders, Dagan supports the application of Israeli sovereignty over parts of Judea and Samaria as called for in the Trump Mideast plan despite the plan’s inclusion of provisions for a future Palestinian state. All settlement leaders including Dagan oppose such a state, which they say would be a terrorist enclave.

Netanyahu is unlikely to heed Dagan’s call. He is also “up to his neck” in the corona crisis and has made it clear the government won’t move forward without U.S. backing.

Frustrated at Netanyahu’s foot-dragging on the issue after making sovereignty one of his central campaign promises, the Land of Israel Caucus proposed a law on July 13 in the Knesset to extend sovereignty over parts of Judea and Samaria. Little appears yet to have come of it.