Netanyahu’s land grab plan would ‘kill all chances for peace’ between Israel and Palestine, Muslim leaders warn
- The Arab League held an emergency session in response to the Israeli PM’s announcement that he wants to annex one-third of Palestine’s West Bank
- Netanyahu’s plan has been denounced as ‘a vision of apartheid’ that he only put forward to further his struggling campaign for re-election
Arab leaders have denounced Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to annex large swathes of the Palestinian territories if he is re-elected next week as an election stunt that would “kill all chances for peace”.
Netanyahu, who is fighting for his political life ahead of elections on September 17, said he would permanently seize up to one-third of the West Bank, a decision that for decades has been considered an endgame scenario for Palestinians’ aspirations of statehood.
“We haven’t had this kind of opportunity since the [1967] six-day war, and may not have it again for another 50 years,” Netanyahu said, referring to the war in which Israel captured the land.
Arab foreign ministers meeting in Cairo condemned the plan as “a dangerous development and a new Israeli aggression by declaring the intention to violate the international law”.