Gaza - War does not determine who is right - only who is left

[BruceVC]

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/23/world/middleeast/trump-israel-west-bank-annexation.html 

 

This story is a few days old but relevant for the future of the region

Israel's Knesset  voted "  symbolically "  in a razor thing majority to annex parts of  the West Bank but the US rejected this firmly and vociferously

 

Netanyahu and Likud also voted against it because this would have undermined the US peace plan that Trump is responsible  for and Netanyahu doesn't want to upset or alienate Trump

Its another example of the influence the US has over Israel

 

"The next steps in shaping a peaceful, postwar Gaza remain vague, but the Trump administration has made one thing clear. Any Israeli attempt to annex parts of the occupied West Bank will not be tolerated. President Trump drove the point home in an interview with Time magazine published on Thursday.

“It won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries,” he said of West Bank annexation. “Israel would lose all of its support from the United States if that happened.”

The day before the interview came out, the Israeli Knesset, or Parliament, passed two largely symbolic votes in favor of annexing land in the West Bank, a territory that much of the world envisions as the core of a future Palestinian state. The United States is Israel’s most important ally and the preliminary votes clearly raised the hackles of the Trump administration, which has worked hard to keep its Arab partners to the Gaza deal on board.

Vice President JD Vance, who was wrapping up a two-day visit to Israel on Thursday, vented his anger at the vote. He said someone had told him that this was a symbolic political stunt with no practical significance. “If it was a political stunt, it was a very stupid political stunt, and I personally take some insult to it,” he said. “The West Bank is not going to be annexed by Israel. The policy of the Trump administration is that the West Bank will not be annexed by Israel.

The Wednesday votes took place on the same day he arrived in the country. The messages left Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu scrambling to distance himself on Thursday from the votes that angered the U.S. administration. “The Knesset vote on annexation was a deliberate political provocation by the opposition to sow discord during Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Israel,” he said in a statement issued in English. " 

[Zoraptor]

Pretty good example that unconditional support results in no influence, really. After all for all the supposed influence and goodwill and backing Israel to the hilt the Israeli's voted against the US position, not for it. 

Anyway, time for a related summary. So far Israel has

(1) not opened the border crossings it was required to

(2) not allowed in the aid it was required to

(3) not set the 'yellow line' where anyone else thinks it ought to be. Indeed, it hasn't set its version of the yellow line where it claims it ought to be itself on its military's own website, but well inside what should be Palestinian territory. Resulting in

(4) continuing low level attacks on Palestinian civilians, continuing starvation and malnutrition but most importantly political leaders and media can at least now pretend it isn't happening.