After the US presidential election in November, Israel should claim sovereignty over Judea and Samaria and offer local autonomy but not voting rights to Palestinians, David Friedman, the Five Towns native and former US ambassador to Israel, told the Knesset.
Friedman’s remarks came a day before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was scheduled to address a joint session of Congress, and about four years after the previous administration approved the Jewish state’s annexation of some 30% of the disputed territory.
“It doesn’t matter if you are a person of faith or an atheist, this is the best outcome for regional stability, for Israel and all its neighbors,” Friedman said in a keynote address at the Knesset’s Israel Victory Caucus.
The former US envoy admitted that his plan couldn’t “get done tomorrow” and needs “buy-in from the rest of the world.” But he said that it’s the best alternative to a two-state solution, which he and many Israelis view as anathema but Washington and other countries see as the ideal resolution to the conflict.
“It’s not what America thinks, the United Nations thinks or the Quartet [composed of US, UN, EU and Russian mediators] thinks. It’s what Israel thinks,” Friedman said in his first address to the Knesset since leaving public office in January 2021.
“The longer Israel punts this issue, the less seriously it will be taken by others when it makes the decision,” he added.
Friedman, whose book “One Jewish State” is due out in September, compared his plan for Palestinians to the situation of Puerto Ricans, who are US citizens and have local autonomy but don’t vote.
“Nobody accuses the United States of being an apartheid state,” he said.
Such a move would ensure the preservation of two Israeli Basic Laws by affording dignity and liberty to the Palestinians, while Jews would retain the right, uniquely, to a Jewish state, according to Friedman.
There has been a moment of clarity, where “politics and faith converged,” for Jews and Christians after Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror attack, he said.
“It’s a dangerous time, but a time fraught with massive opportunities. The solutions are staring us in the face.”