A ‘New Homeland’ for West Bank Palestinians

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday strongly opposed President Obama’s call to freeze settlement activity in the West Bank. The Israeli parliament, meantime, has proposed that Jordan should become the new homeland of those Palestinians living on the West Bank, but the Jordanian government is not exactly thrilled by that idea.

The Christian Science Monitor:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and senior members of his cabinet have pushed back hard against a renewed US demand to end settlement activity in the occupied Palestinian territories. Interior Minister Eli Yishai said Sunday that it amounted to “expulsion.”

But 53 Israeli parliamentarians have moved to explore another kind of expulsion: Under a proposal to be reviewed this week, Jordan would become the official homeland for Palestinians now living in the West Bank.

Among the challenges facing the proposal is this: nobody asked Jordan if it would support such a plan.

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Flickr / ST33VO

Sunrise over Jordan, across the Gulf of Aqaba at the northern end of the Red Sea.