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(LifeSiteNews) — With the world’s eyes distracted by the Trump-brokered ceasefire in Gaza, another war is rapidly increasing in the occupied territories of the West Bank.
Warnings that the extremist government of Benjamin Netanyahu may violate more international law and press ahead with plans to “annex the West Bank” appear to have been affirmed. A wave of violence by Israeli “settlers” – protected by the Israeli army – raises fears that Israel’s war was never about Hamas or hostages.
According to a video report by Al Jazeera’s The Listening Post, it was instead, “A war to steal Palestinian land.”
How serious is the situation in the West Bank? Ehud Olmert, a former prime minister of Israel, said Monday in Haaretz, “Israel Must Fight the Violent Jewish Terrorists in the West Bank.”
Olmert and increasing numbers of other Israelis are describing the messianic, racist-supremacist, religious, so-called “settlers” as “violent pogromists.” They are being seen as the real or worst terrorists in Israel. Olmert said that, “We no longer have the option of resigning ourselves to the violent Jewish terrorism that is spreading across the West Bank.”
Where does the violence come from? Alongside an Israeli army offensive launched on January 21, Olmert says that “young men – and many older men” are committing “terrorism … inspired by Kahanism.”
Kahanism – classified by the U.S. FBI as a terrorist ideology – is the Armageddonist politics of national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and of Bezalel Smotrich, who has long vowed to annex the West Bank that has legally been assigned mostly to Palestinians, who are by far the dominant population.
The West Bank also includes a minority of Israeli Jews, plus some Christians. The Church of the Nativity in Bethehem is in the West Bank. Palestinian Arabs claim East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state.
READ: Inside the rise of an Israeli faction seeking to provoke Armageddon
Ministers in the Israeli Parliament are currently “pushing laws … to permit Jews to buy West Bank land.”
Olmert says in “recent months” violent Jewish gangs have become “unbridled pogromists,” explaining how an escalating campaign of state-permitted terror has engulfed the West Bank. “They pounce on Palestinians … and destroy their property, burning their houses and fields.”
A separate report details how a two-year-old child was “shot in the head” and killed during a family dinner, when Israeli army troops “fired on the family home without warning or justification.”
Olmert says Israeli violence in the West Bank threatens national security and could plunge the nation into civil war: “There is no way to obscure this phenomenon, which is expanding and threatening to ignite a third intifada across the entire country.”
Astonishingly, this is taking place with the tacit – or even secret – approval of Donald Trump, according to some commentators.
Al-Jazeera’s report suggests a “deal between Trump and Netanyahu” to realize the plan announced by Israeli minister Bezalel Smotrich earlier in 2024.
Smotrich, who is responsible for policy concerning the West Bank, has called for the establishment of a “Greater Israel” to include Gaza, the West Bank, parts of Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq, and Jordan.
READ: Israeli minister brags about disturbing plan of conquering the Middle East
Smotrich also published a blueprint for the annexation of the occupied territories of the West Bank, which are supposed to be preserved to permit the creation of a future Palestinian state. This “two-state solution” is widely accepted as being the only realistic basis for a lasting peace in Israel.
It may be news to Western audiences – who have been told that the United States supports a two-state solution – that Israel’s Parliament voted almost unanimously “against the establishment of a Palestinian state.” Israel relies on U.S. financial and military support to survive, but its politics bears no relation to the promises delivered to the American people so far.
Instead, Smotrich has offered the resident non-Jewish population – which includes Catholics and Christians – three options: they can submit to second class citizenship with no legal rights, they can leave, or they can be killed.
READ: Israel is evicting one of the last Christian families near the birthplace of our Lord Jesus
Al-Jazeera reports that the “next four years” under Trump are seen by Smotrich and his supporters as a “golden opportunity” to absorb as much of the West Bank into Israel as possible.
Trump’s victory in November was celebrated by Smotrich, who saw the new president’s success as a “green light” for his plans to annex “Judea and Samaria” – which is how Zionists refer to the land.
READ: Is Trump planning to give Israel the green light to annex the West Bank?
Yet Al-Jazeera is not alone in this assessment of the price of a peace in Gaza which many say may only be a pause and not an end to Israel’s documented war crimes.
The role of the Palestinian Authority is also dubious, with a plan suggested last week for the West Bank leader Mahmoud Abbas to be handed authority to rule over Gaza.
Reports suggest that the Palestinian Authority, which has long been a rival to Hamas, is complicit in the escalating attacks carried out by the Israeli military in the West Bank. Meanwhile, Haaretz reports that Netanyahu’s stated opposition to Hamas is “an outright lie.” In reality, it said, “Netanyahu has not only spoken with Hamas, he has cushioned it with a huge amount of money, and is now cooperating with them, even if indirectly.”
Far from a pathway to peace, Odeh Bisharat’s article concludes that Netanyahu is “sending Israel and Palestine back to the starting point.”
Israeli offensive in the West Bank
The ongoing offensive in the West Bank city of Jenin is reported by independent outlet OPMT news, whose coverage includes citizen-captured footage of Israeli military operations – and also of the actions of “resistance” fighters opposing the incursion.
The report cites poor governance by the Palestinian Authority in Jenin, which has led to a “rise in militancy” in the troubled city.
As Oneindia News reported on Sunday, Trump has taken a “U-turn,” and now again “allows Israel to use 2,000-pound bombs” supplied by the U.S. in its ongoing operations. The price of peace in our timelines is coming at a cost that is not covered by mainstream reporting.
Further disturbing news came from Trump’s remarks in Las Vegas on Saturday. The Times of India reported the president as saying,“He’d like to see Jordan, Egypt and other Arab nations increase the number of Palestinian refugees they are accepting from the Gaza Strip – potentially moving out enough of the population to ‘just clean out’ the war-torn area to create a virtual clean slate.”
The U.K.’s Guardian reported Trump saying “it’s over” for the Gazans – and that they should rebuild their lives in other “Arab nations.” It makes one wonder if Trump also sees the Palestinians as being lesser humans with no human rights.
“I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations and build housing at a different location where they can maybe live in peace for a change,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One. “You’re talking about probably a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing and say: ‘You know, it’s over.’”
Jordan “already holds 2.7 million Palestinian refugees,” the report added, noting the Jordanian foreign minister’s opposition to more migrants was “unwavering.”
Haaretz warned that even the mention of such a move could “poison Israel’s relations” with these states, undermining regional peace. Israeli politicians have called in the past for the Palestinians to be “transferred” abroad – to Europe.
(US) Bombs away
Another plan by Trump, already enacted, will have a much more immediate effect.
The Times of Israel confirmed on January 26 that Trump had “ended the hold on the delivery of 2,000-pound bombs to Israel” that had slaughtered tens of thousands of innocents, and the use of which was put in place by Joe Biden.
The report went on to suggest more mass killing U.S. weapons may also be on the way.
“While the president didn’t provide further details, his post could suggest that there were more weapons shipments delayed beyond the 2,000-pound bombs, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed.”
Israel is a terrorist state – former prime minister
The state of Israel is, according to one of its former leaders, arming and promoting terrorism within its own borders. Speaking of the Israeli mobs in the West Bank, Ehud Olmert said:
These are violent terrorists operating in large and organized groups. This is not a negligible minority. There is a large community of rioters carrying rifles that in many cases were given to them unlawfully as part of Ben-Gvir’s campaign of distributing weapons.
Of course, this would not be the first criminal action of this government. As Olmert also noted:
Lt. Gen. Moshe Ya’alon, a former defense minister and IDF chief of staff … accused the state and the army of committing ethnic cleansing in Gaza.
The twelfth prime minister of Israel warned that – regardless of what the headlines say today, “If we don’t immediately end these assaults and other acts of violence, we will all be responsible for them.”
That would of course also very much also include United States complicity in the mass killing resulting from its constant supply of these death weapons to Israel which Americans have never been asked to approve.
The crisis in the West Bank has not been priced into any meaningful peace. With a government in Israel partnered with terrorism, and seemingly determined to expel its non-Jewish population, the question of whether anyone will be held responsible for Israel’s politics of permanent war remains open.
The message is clear from within as well as outside of Israel – that peace has no chance while Israel is led by Netanyahu and his extremist government. With a United States now claiming to pursue national security by the promotion of world peace, what place does Netanyahu have in Donald Trump’s grand plan?
Help bring aid trucks into Gaza: LifeFunder