Threats of the Israeli annexation of the West Bank have resurfaced more forcefully after recent reports that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in closed meetings that annexation should be put back on the government’s agenda. 

Far-right Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich has also said that 2025 “will be the year of the annexation of the West Bank.” His remarks followed the victory of Republican candidate Donald Trump in the US presidential elections in November, which the Israeli Occupying Power (IOP) sees as a good omen for its expansionist project. 

Political observers and analysts agree that annexing the West Bank would constitute a flagrant violation of international law and UN resolutions and an act of contempt towards the international community. Nevertheless, the extreme-right Netanyahu government believes the incoming Trump administration will not only look the other way if it takes such a step but will also cheer it along. 

Washington should not only disabuse IOP leaders of any notion that it would greenlight such an action, but it should also take firm steps to rein them in. Annexation would “open the gates of hell,” as one analyst has put it, not just for Israel but also for US interests in the region and beyond. 

Unlike the other settler-colonialist projects in Algeria or South Africa, the Zionist project in Palestine has been premised since its inception in the late 19th century on the mass expulsion of the indigenous population. The ideology and intention have remained unchanged, even if they are now expressed in euphemisms or pursued incrementally. 

If obstructed, the Zionist project takes the form of gradual settlement expansion and the territorial dispossession of the Palestinians in the Occupied West Bank and the transformation of what remains into isolated Palestinian cantons with an element of self-rule, although Israel controls security completely throughout the Occupied Territories. 

Now, with the Trump electoral win, plans for expulsion are being aired more openly, as Smotrich did it last week.

 Smotrich has long been an ardent advocate of forced displacement, a war crime and a crime against humanity. Addressing a conference organised by the Yesha Council, an umbrella group for the illegal settlements in the Occupied West Bank, Smotrich called for the reoccupation of Gaza and creating a situation to “thin the population by half within two years” through what he termed “voluntary emigration.”  

Once that succeeds, it can be “replicated in the West Bank,” he said, according to a report in the Israeli newspaper The Times of Israel. 

Netanyahu has consistently obstructed all efforts to promote a two-state solution, which Zionists view as an impediment to their dream of a “Greater Israel.” He plans to do everything in his power during Trump’s next four years in office to advance Israel’s annexation schemes and eliminate the Palestinian cause. 

“Netanyahu’s thinking has not changed since he first came to power in 1996,” political analyst Tamara Haddad told Al-Ahram Weekly. “He has clung tenaciously to his three ‘noes’: no to a Palestinian state; no to the return of Palestinian refugees; and no to a divided Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state.”

“It is clear that he espouses the same policy as his most extremist ministers like National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Smotrich. If he can persuade Trump to approve Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank, he will have achieved his dream.”

However, Haddad said that the realities on the ground will not make this easy.

“Moves to annex the West Bank will provoke regional and global outrage as well as the outrage of the Middle Eastern countries, which have united around the need for a comprehensive solution that addresses the root causes of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. This solution must entail the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state. Saudi Arabia, in particular, has indicated that it will not normalise relations with Israel until a Palestinian state is formed,” she said.

Haddad suspects that Trump may be persuaded to strike “deals” to help Israel annex the Jordan Valley and the territories designated as Area C in the Oslo Accords in the 1990s and a large chunk of the illegal settlements in the Occupied Territories as a starting point and then come out in support of the full annexation of the West Bank when the time is right. 

But assuming this scheme is allowed to go ahead, the “Palestinians would have only three options: forced displacement; massacre; or capitulation to subject status,” she said.

“Like the indigenous Arabs in Jerusalem, those who remained would be granted residence permits, but they would never be granted citizenship, because this would diminish the Jewishness of the state.”

Annexation would have three immediate repercussions, according to political analyst Faraj Shalhoub. First, it would end all talk of a political settlement. Second, it would unleash a wave of unrestrained settlement expansion. Third, it would displace, through “soft” or “hard” coercion, a large portion of the West Bank population, mostly towards Jordan. 

This prospect alarms Amman, which fears that the close relationship between the Trump administration and the IOP will favour the displacement scenario. 

“The coming phase will bring an acceleration in this direction through joint US-Israeli designs that are based on a reading of the region that sees a high degree of fluidity, presenting Israel with an opportunity to advance its plans for the annexation of the West Bank and driving the Palestinians towards Jordan,” Shalhoub said.

Political commentator Mohsen Abu Ramadan has little doubt that Netanyahu and his cohort of extremists assume that the forthcoming Trump administration will present them with a golden opportunity to lift the brakes on annexation. 

They have already been encouraged by several factors, above all, in Abu Ramadan’s opinion, the ability to continue with the genocide in Gaza without facing serious repercussions from the international community, and likewise with their systemic attacks against the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Palestinian villages and refugee camps in the West Bank. 

“Trump’s incoming pro-Zionist team has whetted the extremists’ appetite as never before. I believe Netanyahu thinks the historical moment has come for him and his extreme right-wing government to carry out the annexation and Judaisation of the West Bank. How he will deal with the West Bank’s citizens is unclear,” Abu Ramadan said.

The threat of Israel imposing full sovereignty over the West Bank, as proposed by Netanyahu’s extremist government, “is more serious than ever,” political analyst Nidal Khadra warned. “We may soon see practical measures towards this end, given the close alliance between the right-wing Israeli government and the incoming right-wing American administration.” 

Khadra recalled Trump’s remark during the presidential campaign about how Israel was “so tiny” and his question about whether “there was any way of getting it more space”. 

 “The first place that comes to mind in that regard is the West Bank,” Khadra said, adding that “the Israeli far-right, driven by a fundamentalist Talmudic vision, wants to make 2025 the year of imposing sovereignty over the West Bank. They are banking on explicit support from the second Trump administration, just as in his first term he supported the annexation of the Occupied Syrian Golan Heights, the transfer of the US Embassy to Jerusalem, and the recognition of Jerusalem as the eternal capital of Israel.”

A study by the Commanders for Israel’s Security (CIS), a movement of former Israeli security officials, has warned that the annexation of the West Bank, even partially, would lead to the collapse of the Palestinian Authority (PA), the end of security coordination, and the imposition of a military administration over the whole of the West Bank. 

Citing this study, Israeli-Palestinian affairs specialist Shaul Arieli warned of the grave consequences of any step aiming to annex parts of the West Bank. He noted the significant increase in settlement construction in recent years, with 22 outposts “legalised” retroactively and 79 new outposts established. 

This “creeping annexation” has complicated the situation on the ground as it has created structures that will facilitate the far-right push for annexation, he said.

If annexation occurs, even if backed by the US, it would trigger a “diplomatic tsunami.” European and Arab countries would hit Israel with economic and diplomatic sanctions. Israel would have to double its military presence in the West Bank, rendering it vulnerable on other fronts. Relations with Egypt and Jordan, which have already withdrawn their ambassadors, would deteriorate further. 

The CIS study further warns of a “point of no return” that will force Israel to choose between a single binational state, in which Jews would no longer make up the majority of the population, or outright apartheid in which Palestinians would be subjected to military rule with no civil rights. It cautions that steps towards annexation would destroy the Israeli vision based on separation between the Israelis and Palestinians, while Israel maintains security control until a comprehensive settlement is reached.

 “Instead of racing after the illusion of a ‘historic opportunity,’ decision-makers should think carefully about the high price Israel could pay,” Arieli said.

* A version of this article appears in print in the 5 December, 2024 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly