The Sovereignty Movement calls for general mobilization of the nationalist camp ahead of election day, to ensure that the government to be formed will block Gantz’s gestures to the Palestinian Authority, which are nothing more than steps leading toward a Palestinian state.
The gestures that Prime Minister Yair Lapid and Defense Minister Benny Gantz have decided to grant the Palestinian Authority in anticipation of the American President’s visit to Israel, prove more than ever, the necessity for mobilization toward forming a broad and stable nationalist government after the elections. This is the position of the Sovereignty Movement.
The movement joins in expressing the concern voiced by leading settlement bodies, among which are the Regavim movement and the YESHA Council, in light of the aforesaid gestures, among other things, freeing many parcels of land in Area C for Arab building, approval for illegal Arab building, granting legal status to thousands of Arabs who immigrated into the area of the PA, etc.
These measures, say the leaders of the Sovereignty Movement, constitute an extremely dangerous milestone, which indicate the trend toward implementing the idea of establishing a Palestinian state in the heart of the Land of Israel. “For more than a decade, the settlement in Judea and Samaria has been dealing with the systematic and orderly plan by the PA to take over more and more open land in parts of Area C. Israeli governments have not advanced a counter-plan to stop the dangerous trend of determining Arab facts on the ground, and now, the present government is making the situation worse by granting approval to illegal Arab building, adding legal sanction to Arab building in vast additional areas. It is thereby lending a hand to lawlessness, strengthening the Arab hold in the area and creating nooses around Israeli settlements”.
The movement also notes the seriousness of the decision to ratify the legal status of thousands of Arabs who immigrated into the PA. “This step, which is not the first of its kind under the leadership of Benny Gantz as Defense Minister, constitutes part of the Israeli submission to the demands of the PA for the “right of return”. Encouraging Arab immigration from around the world into parts of the Land of Israel gives a tailwind to Arab terror and is contrary to the essence of the Zionist vision”.
“These steps are taken under the public’s radar and are contrary to the agreements made by the present government, according to which, the government will not take any controversial steps. These things are being done during a transitional government, a fact which makes them even worse”, say the movement’s leaders, noting that the lack of response by right-wing members of Knesset and ministers prove the absurdity of attempting to establish a government that includes both Left and Right, without a unified ideological backbone. “It again becomes clear that the representatives of the Right are silent and apathetic when confronted with ruinous steps taken by the Left that are taken contrary to the position of the Israeli public and contrary to its partners in the government”.
The co-chairwomen of the Sovereignty Movement, Yehudit Katsover and Nadia Matar, view these steps, promoted by Minister Benny Gantz as “evidence of our duty to mobilize with significant hasbara activities before the elections in order to lead to a broad and stable nationalist government that is committed to the Zionist vision, to promote steps of Israeli sovereignty over the entire Land of Israel and remove dangerous ideas of dividing the Land and establishing a terror state in its heart from the public agenda”.