JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday he has discussed legislation with the United States that would annex settlements in the occupied West Bank, but the White House denied it in a rare show of disunity.
Netanyahu later issued a clarification somewhat backing away from the deeply controversial statement.
Annexing settlements would severely damage remaining prospects for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and draw international outrage, but Netanyahu has been under heavy political pressure to support it.
“Regarding the issue of applying sovereignty, I can tell you that I have for some time been speaking with the Americans about it,” Netanyahu told lawmakers from his Likud party, according to comments relayed by a spokesman.
Netanyahu said he wanted to coordinate any such “historic” move with the United States because of the country’s strategic importance to Israel, his spokesman said.
Some Israeli media interpreted the comments as the first time Netanyahu expressed support for annexing the settlements.
But when it became clear the White House was not confirming the remarks, Netanyahu’s office issued a clarification.
Netanyahu “did not present the United States with specific annexation proposals, and in any case the United States did not give its consent to the proposals,” an Israeli official said on condition of anonymity.
“Israel updated the United States on various proposals raised in the (parliament), and the United States expressed its clear position that it seeks to advance President Trump’s peace plan.”
The official added that Netanyahu’s position “is that if the Palestinians persist in their refusal to negotiate peace, Israel will present its own alternatives.”
White House spokesman Josh Raffel said “reports that the United States discussed with Israel an annexation plan for the West Bank are false.”
“The United States and Israel have never discussed such a proposal, and the president’s focus remains squarely on his Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative.”
Saeb Erekat, secretary general of the Palestine Liberation Organization, had condemned Netanyahu’s earlier remarks as amounting to “land theft” with US complicity.
Netanyahu faces pressure from right-wing politicians to move ahead with legislation that would apply Israeli sovereignty to settlements in the West Bank.
Two lawmakers, including one from Netanyahu’s party, have proposed such legislation.
Netanyahu blocked it from being advanced on Sunday, with officials citing the need to focus on security issues following a confrontation that led to Israeli air strikes in Syria at the weekend.
Israel has sought to take advantage of Trump’s strong support, highlighted by his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in December, called “historic” by Netanyahu but denounced by the Palestinians and most of the rest of the world.
Monday’s episode showed there may be limits to Trump’s backing as he pledges to reach what he calls the “ultimate deal” — Israeli-Palestinian peace.
While Israel would expect to retain certain settlements in any two-state peace deal, longstanding international consensus has been that their status must be negotiated.
The same consensus has been in place for decades regarding the status of Jerusalem, with the Palestinians wanting the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of the city as the capital of their future state.
Israeli settlements are located in what is known as Area C of the West Bank, which accounts for more than 60 percent of the Palestinian territory.
Annexing all settlements would leave little space for a Palestinian state.
Netanyahu heads what is seen as the most right-wing government in Israeli history, and prominent ministers openly oppose a Palestinian state.
Those who oppose a Palestinian state advocate for Israel to annex most of the West Bank, citing Jews’ historical ties to the land from the biblical era.
Netanyahu says he wants the Palestinians to govern themselves, but in recent months has declined to specify whether that would mean an independent Palestinian state or some lesser form of autonomy.
He has stressed recently that Israel must retain security control in the Palestinian territories under any peace arrangement.
While Trump has offered strong support of Israel, he said in an interview published Sunday that he was “not necessarily sure” the country was seeking to reach a peace agreement with the Palestinians.
“Right now, I would say the Palestinians are not looking to make peace,” Trump said in the interview with right-wing Israeli paper Israel Hayom.
“And I am not necessarily sure that Israel is looking to make peace.”
In a rare rebuke, he also said Israeli settlement building “complicates” peace efforts.
Separately, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Monday.
Putin said at the start of the talks that he “just spoke” with Trump on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
US denies discussing West Bank settlements annexation with Netanyahu
US denies discussing West Bank settlements annexation with Netanyahu
Syria authorities say torched 1 million captagon pills
DAMASCUS: Syria’s new authorities torched a large stockpile of drugs on Wednesday, two security officials told AFP, including one million pills of captagon, whose industrial-scale production flourished under ousted president Bashar Assad.
Captagon is a banned amphetamine-like stimulant that became Syria’s largest export during the country’s more than 13-year civil war, effectively turning it into a narco state under Assad.
“We found a large quantity of captagon, around one million pills,” said a balaclava-wearing member of the security forces, who asked to be identified only by his first name, Osama, and whose khaki uniform bore a “public security” patch.
An AFP journalist saw forces pour fuel over and set fire to a cache of cannabis, the painkiller tramadol, and around 50 bags of pink and yellow captagon pills in a security compound formerly belonging to Assad’s forces in the capital’s Kafr Sousa district.
Captagon has flooded the black market across the region in recent years, with oil-rich Saudi Arabia a major destination.
“The security forces of the new government discovered a drug warehouse as they were inspecting the security quarter,” said another member of the security forces, who identified himself as Hamza.
Authorities destroyed the stocks of alcohol, cannabis, captagon and hashish in order to “protect Syrian society” and “cut off smuggling routes used by Assad family businesses,” he added.
Syria’s new Islamist rulers have yet to spell out their policy on alcohol, which has long been widely available in the country.
Since an Islamist-led rebel alliance toppled Assad on December 8 after a lightning offensive, Syria’s new authorities have said massive quantities of captagon have been found in former government sites around the country, including security branches.
AFP journalists in Syria have seen fighters from Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) set fire to what they said were stashes of captagon found at facilities once operated by Assad’s forces.
Security force member Hamza confirmed Wednesday that “this is not the first initiative of its kind — the security services, in a number of locations, have found other warehouses... and drug manufacturing sites and destroyed them in the appropriate manner.”
Maher Assad, a military commander and the brother of Bashar Assad, is widely accused of being the power behind the lucrative captagon trade.
Experts believe Syria’s former leader used the threat of drug-fueled unrest to put pressure on Arab governments.
A Saudi delegation met Syria’s new leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa in Damascus on Sunday, a source close to the government told AFP, to discuss the “Syria situation and captagon.”
Jordan in recent years has also cracked down on the smuggling of weapons and drugs including captagon along its 375-kilometer (230-mile) border with Syria.
Jordan says 18,000 Syrians returned home since Assad’s fall
AMMAN: About 18,000 Syrians have crossed into their country from Jordan since the government of Bashar Assad was toppled earlier this month, Jordanian authorities said on Thursday.
Interior Minister Mazen Al-Faraya told state TV channel Al-Mamlaka that “around 18,000 Syrians have returned to their country between the fall of the regime of Bashar Assad on December 8, 2024 until Thursday.”
He said the returnees included 2,300 refugees registered with the United Nations.
Amman says it has hosted about 1.3 million Syrians who fled their country since civil war broke out in 2011, with 650,000 formally registered with the United Nations.
Lebanon hopes for neighborly relations in first message to new Syria government
- Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah played a major part propping up Syria’s ousted President Bashar Assad through years of war
- Syria’s new Islamist de-facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa is seeking to establish relations with Arab and Western leaders
DUBAI: Lebanon said on Thursday it was looking forward to having the best neighborly relations with Syria, in its first official message to the new administration in Damascus.
Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib passed the message to his Syrian counterpart, Asaad Hassan Al-Shibani, in a phone call, the Lebanese Foreign Ministry said on X.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah played a major part propping up Syria’s ousted President Bashar Assad through years of war, before bringing its fighters back to Lebanon over the last year to fight in a bruising war with Israel – a redeployment which weakened Syrian government lines.
Under Assad, Hezbollah used Syria to bring in weapons and other military equipment from Iran, through Iraq and Syria and into Lebanon. But on Dec. 6, anti-Assad fighters seized the border with Iraq and cut off that route, and two days later, Islamist militants captured the capital Damascus.
Syria’s new Islamist de-facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa is seeking to establish relations with Arab and Western leaders after toppling Assad.
Iraqi intelligence chief discusses border security with new Syrian administration
BAGHDAD: An Iraqi delegation met with Syria’s new rulers in Damascus on Thursday, an Iraqi government spokesman said, the latest diplomatic outreach more than two weeks after the fall of Bashar Assad’s rule.
The delegation, led by Iraqi intelligence chief Hamid Al-Shatri, “met with the new Syrian administration,” government spokesman Bassem Al-Awadi told state media, adding that the parties discussed “the developments in the Syrian arena, and security and stability needs on the two countries’ shared border.”
