Netanyahu election rival commits to suspension of West Bank annexation 

The leader of Israel’s Tikva Hadasha (New Hope) party, Gideon Sa’ar, has said that he will respect Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s commitment to suspend annexation plans in the occupied West Bank if he becomes his successor after the next election.

“If I become the new prime minister of Israel, I will fulfill the commitment that Netanyahu has given from Israel to the United States administration,” he was quoted by i24 News as saying.

Speaking in an online meeting with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Sa’ar stressed that the idea of imposing Israeli sovereignty over the illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank remains an “Israeli goal”. However, he added, Netanyahu had pledged to the US administration that he will suspend such a move for a “number of years”.

Sa’ar, who is currently vying to become prime minister in next month’s General Election, was Israel’s education minister and then interior minister from 2009 to 2014. He served as a Knesset member for Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud party from 2003 to 2014, before he left the party to lead the New Hope party.

READ: Palestinian elections and the West