NETANYAHU HAILS TRUMP VICTORY, APPOINTS EXTREMIST
U.S. AMBASSADOR; HUCKABEE NAMED U.S. ENVOY TO ISRAEL
Allan C. Brownfeld, Editor
Special Interest Report
December 2024
Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election was welcomed by Israeli
Prime Minister Netanyahu. According to the Washington Post (Nov. 7, 2024),
“Netanyahu rejoiced over Donald Trump’s election victory as he banked on
resetting relations with Washington and following through on his maximalist aims
in the country’s multi-front war…Israel Ganz, head of a council representing
Israeli settlers across the occupied West Bank, celebrated the moment as a
historic ‘opportunity for the settlement movement’…There was optimism among
hawks that Trump would allow Israel to confront Iran more directly.”
Prime Minister Netanyahu announced the appointment of a new ambassador to the
U.S., Yechiel Leiter. A native of the U.S. who emigrated to Israel, Leiter is
an activist associated with the extreme elements of the settler movement. He is
himself a settler and resides in the West Bank. He is a strong proponent of the
expansion of illegal West Bank settlements. The Israeli newspaper Haaretz
((Nov. 9, 2024) declared that “By appointing a prominent settler activist as
Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., Netanyahu is signaling his belief that Trump
will support the unilateral Israeli annexation of the West Bank and parts of the
Gaza Strip.”
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (Nov. 11, 2024) noted that, “His appointment
likely signals that Netanyahu expects the incoming Trump administration to take
a friendlier approach to Israeli West Bank settlements than President Joe
Biden’s administration. Trump unveiled a peace plan in the final year of his
first term that would have left Israel in control of vast swaths of the West
Bank, and Trump’s ambassador to Israel during his first term, David Friedman,
was also a supporter of settlements…In 2020, in a letter to American Christians,
Leiter hailed Trump’s presidency and encouraged U.S. support for settlements.
He called the first Trump administration ‘the best three years in U.S.-Israel
relations ever.’”
President-elect Trump has named former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee to be
U.S. ambassador to Israel. During his 1988 presidential campaign, Huckabee
declared that “There is really no such thing as a Palestinian” and advocated
Israeli annexation of the West Bank. He said that “The title deed (to the West
Bank) was given by God to Abraham and his heirs.” He described himself as “an
unapologetic, unreformed Zionist.”
In an article headlined “Mike Huckabee’s Old-School Christian Zionism Is Bad
News For Anyone Who Wants Middle East Peace,” Tristan Stura, writing in The
Forward (Nov. 15, 2024) argues that, “Huckabee is an old-school Christian
Zionist with the goal of establishing full Israeli sovereignty over Gaza and the
West Bank…The goal of the ideology…is the removal of Palestinians from the
biblically defined land of Israel to facilitate Christ’s return…Under Huckabee’s
ambassadorship , Israel will become markedly less likely to find a peaceful
resolution to this brutal conflict.”
Israel’s finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, on Nov. 11, welcomed Donald Trump’s
victory and said it meant "the time has come to exert full Israeli sovereignty
over parts of the occupied West Bank." He told members of his Religious Zionist
Party that, “Trump’s victory brings an important opportunity…We were on the
verge of applying sovereignty over the settlements” on the West Bank. “Now,” he
said, “the time has come to make it a reality.”
The highest U.N. Court this year ordered Israel to end its occupation of
Palestinian territory, evacuate existing settlements and pay reparations to
Palestinians who have lost land and property. The Israeli government declined
to participate in the proceedings, which Netanyahu described as an “abuse of
international law and the judicial process,” and rejected the “false decision
they produce.” *
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