The government may be on the way to annexing the Jordan Valley, with the Ministerial Committee for Legislation approving a bill to that effect Sunday.
The proposal by MK Miri Regev (Likud Beytenu) would apply Israeli law to the area, significantly limiting Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Justice Minister Tzipi Livni in peace talks.
If the bill becomes law, Netanyahu would be unable to accept the American offer to put the Jordan Valley and border crossings into Jordan under Palestinian control, with IDF soldiers posted at the border and the US providing additional security.
The ministerial committee`s approval of this bill now, when there are talks with the Palestinians, is a clear statement by the government that the towns in the Jordan Valley are a strategic and security asset of the State of Israel that must stay in our hands, Regev said.
According to Regev, the Jordan Valley is the safety belt on the eastern border.
Interior Minister Gideon Sa`ar worked to convince the committee to approve the bill, saying there is no separation between settlement and security, and the Jordan Valley is a consensus among Israeli citizens. There`s nothing wrong with everyone knowing that the Jordan Valley will remain Israeli in any final status agreement.
Eight ministers on the committee, all from the Likud, Yisrael Beytenu or Bayit Yehudi, voted in favor of the bill, while Hatnua and Yesh Atid ministers opposed.
Regev thanked Interior Minister Gideon Sa`ar and Housing and Construction Minister Uri Ariel for pushing the bill through the committee. She and Sa`ar plan to visit the Jordan Valley later this week.
Livni, Finance Minister Yair Lapid and Health Minister Yael German said they would submit an appeal of the vote.
Following their appeal, the bill would be brought back to a second vote by all of the ministers, where the combination of Bayit Yehudi, Yisrael Beytenu and Likud ministers, minus Netanyahu, would give it a broad majority.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat condemned the bill, telling Ma`an the vote in favor of it shows Israel`s indifference to international law, as well as undermining US Secretary of State John Kerry`s efforts for peace.
Erekat also said the Palestinian response to the bill should be to seek statehood recognition from all international bodies.
MK Nitzan Horowitz (Meretz) said the committee`s approval of the bill indicates that Netanyahu suffers from a split personality, or he`s a serial cheat.
On the one hand, he frees murdering terrorists and with the other he allows the extremists in his party pass laws that stop negotiations. On the one hand he sends Tzipi Livni to talk to the Palestinians and on the other he builds settlements. Either way, he is hurting the citizens of Israel, Horowitz said.
This government is being outrageously irresponsible, MK Nachman Shai (Labor) said. Instead of promoting the only way to save the State of Israel from becoming a binational state, it is ruining any chance of a treaty and deteriorating us to international isolation.
According to Shai, the vote reveals the government`s real face, even though it is negotiating with the Palestinians.
In the coalition, Yesh Atid faction chairman Ofer Shelah called the bill irresponsible and dangerous, which causes harm even if it does not become law in the end.
The fact that all Likud ministers voted for this bill raises questions about the prime minister`s party`s seriousness, since he decided to enter negotiations with the Palestinians while his ministers support a bill that will tie Israel`s hands in those talks and makes us look like we`re doing everything to sabotage them, Shelah said.
JPost.com staff contributed to this report.
