Edelstein: I won’t let us create a Palestinian state on our territory

Edelstein was speaking less than a week after Israel agreed to suspend its planed annexation of West Bank settlements in exchange for a peace deal with the United Arab Emirates.

By TOVAH LAZAROFF
Health Minister Yuli Edelstein (L) alongside Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan, August 18, 2020 (photo credit: SAMARIA REGIONAL COUNCIL)
Health Minister Yuli Edelstein (L) alongside Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan, August 18, 2020
(photo credit: SAMARIA REGIONAL COUNCIL)
Health Minister Yuli Edelstein [Likud] personally pledge to work against any initiatives to create a Palestinian state in Area C of the West Bank during a visit the Barkan Industrial Park in Samaria.
Such a thing “will not be and will never  happen,” he said.
"A Palestinian state will not be created on our territory in Judea and Samaria. Neighborly relations, ‘yes.’ Co-existence, ‘yes.’ Working side-by-side, ‘yes."
“To create a terror state from which attacks will be launched against Israel is an absurd situation. As an elected official, as a government minister, I won’t let us get to that situation,” Edelstein said.
He spoke less than a week after Israel agreed to suspend its planed annexation of West Bank settlements in exchange for a peace deal with the United Arab Emirates. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised that sovereignty will still be applied, just at a later date.
Pro-sovereignty politicians, such as Edelstein and Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan, who hosted him, fear that the matter has been suspended indefinitely.
Comments by both US President Donald Trump and his Special Advisor Jared Kushner with respect to annexation, have certainly made it see that sovereignty will not occur anytime in the near future. Kushner in particular has spoken of the Israel-UAE deal as an important step toward the creation of a Palestinian state.
Many of the pro-sovereignty supporters are opposed to a Palestinian state, even one done within the context of the Trump peace deal.
“We have not given up on sovereignty in Judea and Samaria. We have to apply Israeli law on all the settlements in Judea and Samaria. We have to tell them finally, you are citizens with the same equitable rights as those in Beersheba or Haifa,” Edelstein said.
He was careful not to say anything negative about Netanyahu, but rather focused on principled points.
Dagan, who is a member of the Likud Central Committee, was not as polite. He stood by Edelstein as he spoke and attacked Netanyahu.
He was incensed as he has been for days, not just by the delay in annexation but by a report in the Hebrew Daily Israel HaYom that Israel planed to sign a memorandum of understanding with the US, to enshrine its commitment to the Trump peace plan.
It’s a move design to assuage fears among the pro-Sovereignty movement that annexation will not occur. But it would be a move that also underscores Israel’s commitment to the creation of a Palestinian state in 70% of the West Bank, a move which many on the Right oppose.
The Trump plan allows for Israel to annex up to 30% of the West Bank, 50% of Area C, but only within the context of a four-year plan toward the creation of a Palestinian state.
Many of the Right want to see all of Area C placed under sovereign Israel and or fear that a Palestinian state would be taken over by Hamas much as Gaza was.
Judea and Samaria was sold out in exchange for a plane ticket to Abu Dhabi and a permit to  sell American weapons to the UAE, just so  in Trump can be saved,” Dagan said, referencing media reports that the deal including the sale of F-35 jets to the UAE.
This is a level of “failure of the highest order,” Dagan added.
“If it is indeed true that the Prime Minister intends to [sign] a "Memorandum of Understanding" which states that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can only be resolve through Trump's vision,” then, “this scandalous and we demand a denial from the Prime Minister,” Dagan said.
It is an “attack from behind the backs of the national camp to bring about a Palestinian through the back door,” he added.
He warned Netanyahu that next time he needed help from the national camp, “you won’t find anyone.”
Yesha Council head and Jordan Valley Regional Council head David Elhayani issued a statement about the possibility of an Israeli-US MOU about the Trump plan.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu it has been revealed time and again that you are an ardent supporter of a Palestinian state. The idea of a signed obligation between you and the US President on the Trump plan is dangerous for Israel’s future,” Elhayani said.
Former US envoy Jason Greenblatt told Army Radio, that although he supports sovereignty, he believed Netanyahu made the correct choice with regard to the Israel-UAE deal.
“We will deal with the issue of Judea and Samaria over time. … We have to fight this fight slowly,” Greenblatt said.
“This issue is going to be part of a much broader and better context, if things go the right way," he said.
He cautioned critics not to “kick and scream every day about it. You need to give the government time to do these deals.”
On Monday, Trump spoke of Jewish dissatisfaction with his actions, at a campaign rally in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.
He didn’t mention the sovereignty issue and instead focused on past gestures his administration had made to Israel.
This included US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the relocation of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and its recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. 
But it was the Evangelicals who were more exited about it than the Jews, he said.
His statement in Oshkosh is one of a number of comments he has made recently about the link between his pro-Israel policies and Christianity.
“We moved the capital of Israel to Jerusalem. That is for the Evangelicals,” Trump said.
You know it is amazing with that. The Evangelicals are more excited about that than Jewish people. It is incredible. But we did. We did that. And Golan Heights, do not forget Golan Heights,” he added.


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