Regarding potential annexation this summer, heightened tensions between Israel and Palestine are growing every day. PM Netanyahu just made a few comment thats might make that even worse - announcing that there would be no citizenship for Palestinians in annexed lands. The Prime Minister also listed 10 difficult conditions for Palestinians to have their own state, or what President Trump considers to be a state. The statement began with a recommitment to his annexation plan in the occupied West bank. However, the shocking announcement that Palestinians living within annexed areas in the Jordan Valley and West Bank will "remain Palestinian subjects in enclaves" under Israeli security control (but not Israeli citizenship). Essentially, what that means is that while Israel will move forward to take Palestinian lands, they will not give the people living there the citizenship of the country they would then supposedly live in.
Israel is planning to annex parts of the West Bank like the Jordan Valley and illegal Israeli settlements. The Jordan Valley and northern Dead Sea, specific parts of potentially annexed areas, make up about 1/3 of the West Bank - about 2,400 square kilometers in area and about 65,000 Palestinians in population. When Israel had previously unilaterally annexed territory, like East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, they did so with the offer of citizenship to residents there. To show how important this is to international relations and world politics, look at how often this occurs. Very Rarely. Since World War II, there have only been 3 cases of annexation in the world: Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Russia's controversial annexation of Crimea (part of Ukraine) in 2014, and Israel's previous seizing of Arab territories since 1967.
In the same statement, Netanyahu said that Palestinians have to meet 10 conditions according to Trump's plan to give Palestine its own state. These include some land-based concessions, especially allowing Israeli authority in the "territories west of Jordan" and allowing Jerusalem to be united in Israel (a huge sticking point for Palestinians). There must also be no uprooting of Israeli communities and the non-entry of a single refugee, the allowance of Israeli sovereignty on huge parts of the West Bank, etc. Palestinians must also recognize that Israeli is in control of security in all areas. This is all in accordance with President Trump's "Deal of the Century" announced Jan 28 of this year.
For now, Palestinians will live in isolated communities ruled by the Palestinian Authority surrounded by territory considered Israeli. If there is a state, IF, in the near future, as a result of meeting the difficult requirements, it would be similar. Such a state would not be anything resembling the West Bank or even certain areas of the that territory. Instead, the Palestinian state would be in the form of an archipelago connected by bridges and tunnels. Imagine that. Millions of people working toward their own state for decades are finally given one, but one that doesn't resemble anything like they've been fighting for. A state made of cities and roads, but nothing in between. A state in which they are not given equal rights and surrounded by Israel on all sides.
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