Right-wing Israeli groups protested outside the weekly Cabinet meeting in Jerusalem on Sunday, calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to resist pressure to include a “pathway to a Palestinian state” in a Gaza peace plan.
The protest—led by the Sovereignty Movement, the Tekuma Movement and other NGOs advocating for Jerusalem to keep control of Judea and Samaria—included coalition lawmakers and activists, Israel National News reported.
“Israel cannot entrust its security borders to hostile elements. Only sovereignty—full control from the [Mediterranean] Sea to the Jordan [River]—will secure the state’s future,” according to the Sovereignty Movement.
“Instead of paving the way to a terror state threatening the heart of the nation, we must advance the vision of sovereignty,” the group stated. “Together, we will ring the bell outside the government meeting.”
Religious Zionism Party lawmaker Ohad Tal, who participated in the rally, told JNS: “I urge Prime Minister Netanyahu to state clearly that Israel opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state—now or in the future, under any conditions.
“A Palestinian state poses an existential threat to Israel. The only viable alternative is Israeli sovereignty in Judea and Samaria,” the Knesset member said.
In a joint statement arranged by the United States on Nov. 14, eight nations working toward ending the war against Hamas terrorism in Gaza expressed support for Washington’s proposed International Stabilization Force that is expected to provide security in the Strip.
According to the statement, signed by Qatar, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Jordan and Turkey, the process also “offers a pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood.”
The joint statement appeared to go further than President Donald Trump’s 20-point peace plan, which Jerusalem has approved, by not leaving Palestinian statehood up for debate.
Religious Zionism lawmaker Simcha Rothman, who spoke at the rally, told JNS the gathering served as a “call for the government, the prime minister and the Cabinet ministers to move forward on the path to sovereignty, because the Knesset has already stated this is the way to go.”
Rothman referenced the Knesset’s July 2024 resolution, which passed by a wide majority and opposed unilateral international recognition of a Palestinian state.
“Our call is to make this an urgent task for the government and not postpone it, because while I don’t believe a Palestinian state is an imminent danger, if we aren’t proactive and don’t advance sovereignty, we will find ourselves confronting what the U.N. Security Council described as a pathway to Palestinian self-determination and a Palestinian state,” he said.
“If we want to prevent that, we must act on the ground — as [Finance Minister Bezalel] Smotrich is doing by building 50 new communities, and roads and farms [in Judea and Samaria]—but it’s not enough. We need to address it in the Cabinet, in the international arena, and apply Israeli sovereignty,” Rothman said.
Jerusalem will not allow a Palestinian state in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, Netanyahu said Nov. 16, responding to criticism from coalition partners.
“Our opposition to a Palestinian state on any territory west of the Jordan River exists, is firm, and has not changed in the slightest,” Netanyahu stated.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar also declared that the Jewish state would “not agree to the establishment of a Palestinian terror state in the heart of the Land of Israel, at point-blank distance from all of its population centers and with topographical control over them.”
