A settlement between the Trump administration and plaintiffs who challenged former U.S. President Joe Biden’s executive order authorizing sanctions on certain Israelis and organizations in Judea and Samaria includes a commitment from the U.S. government not to pursue sanctions against the plaintiffs and affirms that Israel and its citizens will be treated as close allies of the United States.
The Lawfare Project announced the settlement on Thursday, nearly two years after it helped fund a lawsuit challenging Executive Order 14115, which Biden signed in February 2024. The order authorized sanctions against individuals accused of undermining peace, security and stability in Judea and Samaria.
The lawsuit, filed in August 2024 by Texans for Israel, the Israel-based nonprofit Regavim and two Israeli residents, argued that the order was being used to target political advocacy and support for Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria rather than acts of violence. The plaintiffs were represented by Holtzman Vogel Baran Torchinsky & Josefiak PLLC.
As part of the settlement, the U.S. Department of the Treasury stated that it will take no action against the plaintiffs and affirmed that “Israel is one of the United States’ closest allies, and the United States will treat the country and its people accordingly,” according to the Lawfare Project.
The agreement further states that the United States “categorically rejects any policy that would infringe upon Israel’s sovereignty or target private organizations and Israeli citizens living in” Judea and Samaria, the group said.
U.S. President Donald Trump revoked Executive Order 14115 shortly after taking office in January 2025, ending the sanctions program before the case reached trial.
Eugene Kontorovich, a law professor at George Mason University who advised the plaintiffs’ legal team, told JNS that the settlement highlights a significant policy shift from the Biden administration.
“Under any Republican administration, Israelis are never going to be sanctioned simply for advocating against aid to Hamas or advocating against illegal Palestinian construction, as some of our plaintiffs have done,” said Kontorovich, who advised the legal team.
He added that the settlement “marks a sharp contrast” to actions taken by other governments. While the United States has ended the sanctions program, both Canada and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Regavim.
The settlement includes no monetary compensation, according to Kontorovich.
‘An important affirmation’
The Lawfare Project also said the Treasury Department acknowledged that it had no evidence that Reut Ben Haim, founder of the Tzav 9 protest movement opposing the transfer of humanitarian aid that could reach Hamas in Gaza, directly engaged in violent activity. Ben Haim was among those sanctioned under the Biden administration’s policy.
“The people being sanctioned are not even alleged to have engaged in violence—certainly there’s no evidence that they engaged in violence—and in many cases they’re being sanctioned for what we would call advocacy,” Kontorovich told JNS.
The administration’s acknowledgement that Israel is one of the country’s closest allies and will be treated as such is “an important affirmation from President Trump that Israel and America stand together, and certainly sanctioning the citizens of your allies from participating in the democratic process is not how allies should treat allies, and that these sanctions were truly a hostile and horrible act by the Biden administration,” Kontorovich told JNS.
Kontorovich said the administration’s declaration that it would not target private organizations or Israeli citizens living in Judea and Samaria is particularly significant because the lawsuit alleged that the sanctions regime disproportionately targeted Israeli Jews while failing to sanction Palestinian terrorists.
At the same time, he cautioned that future administrations could revisit such policies.
Because sanctions “swing back-and-forth” under administrations, a Democratic administration could still impose sanctions against “Israeli civil society groups for opposing illegal Palestinian activity, and even growing to sanctions on anyone supporting Jews living in Judea and Samaria, which is very much what the European sanctions tend to be really now,” Kontorovich told JNS.
