- Knesset approval of bills to impose Israeli sovereignty over occupied West Bank, Ma’ale Adumim settlement ‘declares war’ on Palestinians, international law, UN

RAMALLAH, Palestine / ISTANBUL

A senior Palestinian official said Israel’s preliminary approval of two bills to impose its sovereignty over the occupied West Bank and one of its largest settlements amounts to “a declaration of war,” calling for Israel to be isolated and boycotted in response.

Mouayyad Shaaban, head of the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission under the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), said in an interview with Anadolu that “no Israeli decision or act can erase the Palestinian identity of the land.”

In a first reading on Wednesday, the Israeli Knesset (parliament) passed two bills, one to annex the occupied West Bank and another to annex the Ma’ale Adumim settlement built on Palestinian land east of Jerusalem. Both bills require three additional readings before becoming law.

The move coincided with US Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Tel Aviv and came less than a month after President Donald Trump declared on Sept. 26 that he would not allow Israel to annex the West Bank.

If enacted, the annexation would end any remaining possibility of implementing the two-state solution envisioned by UN resolutions.

‘Declaration of war’

Shaaban warned that “the decision is dangerous and amounts to “a declaration of war, not only on the Palestinian people but also on the United Nations, the Security Council, and all international laws and resolutions.”

He urged Palestinians to “be present across all our land to prove once again to the (Israeli) occupier that this land is ours. No statement or legislation can change that; what matters is what happens on the ground.”

The Palestinian official also called on the international community to “isolate and boycott this extremist Israeli government politically, economically, and militarily, and ban settlers, government leaders, and their associates from entering any country.”

Recalling Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem after the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, Shaaban said: “Despite that, the minarets of Jerusalem still stand tall, and its people continue to resist. Nothing can erase the Palestinian nature of this land.”

'Loud, unified response'

He said the Israeli plan is the result of ongoing expansion over the past two years, noting that “71% of the West Bank is under Israeli control, with more than 912 military gates, checkpoints, and bases, and over 30% of the Jordan Valley is under Israeli authority.”

Shaaban added that the Palestinian response “must be loud and unified, from unions, political factions, local councils, and families, with farmers returning to their long-seized lands.”

According to the Knesset website, 25 of 120 members voted in favor of the West Bank annexation bill, introduced by Avi Maoz of the far-right Noam party, while 24 opposed it.

Meanwhile, the bill to annex Ma’ale Adumim, submitted by Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu party, passed its preliminary reading with 32 votes in favor and nine against, according to Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.

Ma’ale Adumim, located east of Jerusalem, is one of the largest settlements in the West Bank. Its annexation would sever East Jerusalem from its Palestinian surroundings and divide the West Bank into two disconnected parts.

Palestinians insist that East Jerusalem must serve as the capital of their future state, in line with international resolutions that reject Israel’s 1967 occupation and its 1980 annexation of the city.

In a landmark opinion last July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.