E1

A government headed by opposition Yashar Party leader Gadi Eisenkot would likely abandon Mr. Netanyahu's most provocative policies, such as encouraging vigilante settler attacks on West Bank Palestinians.

severely restricting the movement of Palestinians in the West Bank and developing the East One or E1 settlement block that would separate East Jerusalem from the West Bank and bisect the territory into an unconnected northern and southern region.

An Eisenkot government could also be more constructive in the implementation of Mr. Trump's 20-point Gaza peace plan and tackle out-of-control crime in Israeli-Palestinian towns and cities.

All these are measures Mr. Eisenkot's government would tout in an effort to polish Israel's tarnished image in an environment in which anyone would be welcomed as a breath of fresh air compared to Mr. Netanyahu and his religious ultra-nationalist cohorts.

But opposing Netanyahu doesn't necessarily mean you oppose annexation.

Bennett supports expanding Israeli settlements, including in the controversial E1 area, and has advocated Israeli sovereignty over Area C of the West Bank, which comprises roughly 60% of the territory.

Avigdor Lieberman, another Netanyahu opponent, has also supported annexing Area C. Eisenkot is somewhat different.

He supports settlements authorized under Israeli law, but opposes unauthorized outposts, settler violence against Palestinians, and construction in E1, which would threaten the territorial continuity of a future Palestinian state.

So he takes a bit of a softer stance.

Then you have Yair Golan, who leads the center-left Democrats.

And that's really depressing for the outlook.

I do think that the new government might make a difference in reality, for example, when it comes to extreme settler violence, especially also when it comes to the E1 projects that one of the major Discussion points also with the European Union, and there has been some pressure mounting also with the recent British position.

And Eisen has reacted here, said that now is not the time to proceed with the E1 settlement block, which is considered a major nail in the coffin of the two-state solution.

Yossi, can I ask, how much damage do you think this current Israeli government under Benjamin Netanyahu has done to not just Israel and its reputation globally, but to the safety and security of Jewish people around the world?

I think first and foremost, you know, Netanyahu always fashioned himself as Mr.

It's a trial that goes on for years.

It's that you don't have the Ben-Gurion-Smotrich language, the vitriol against almost everyone that disagrees with them.

So they can take certain steps, whether E1 or violence in the West Bank, what happened in Gaza.

He needs the far-right Jewish supremacist parties to prop him up in power at the moment.

So they've been pushing very hard to expand all those Israeli settlements in the West Bank, judged as illegal under international law, but now championed by Netanyahu's government and those... those far-right ministers in his cabinet, especially the highly controversial E1 proposed new Israeli settlement.

And that would basically cut off Palestinian Eastern Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank.

Some, of course, the British government has brought out sanctions against controversy in the last month as well.

For us sitting here in Europe or America who might be concerned about what's still going on in Gaza and the intolerable conditions there, or the increased settler colonisation of the West Bank and some horrible scenes we saw over the weekend, you're suggesting that we shouldn't necessarily see a massive change from the Eisenhower government that might be about to come.

Sure, a little bit less aggressive.

Perhaps he opposes that very controversial E1 settlement that would block the West Bank from East Jerusalem.

But otherwise, continuum.

And again, some of this started before October 7th, but has certainly deepened in the year since that with just a very, you know, kind of fractured society, I think one could say.

20 years ago, after Israel's withdrawal of its troops and settlers from inside Gaza to the perimeter, I was on a hilltop, a hilltop called E1 in the West Bank.

And Benjamin Netanyahu effectively launched his leadership campaign for the Likud party there, saying the then prime minister would not build on E1 hilltop, this crucial bit of land that is just to the east of Jerusalem.

I will build here.

And 20 years later, where E1 has still come up, it's been resisted by the international community.

The Americans have said not to build here.

Do we expect that Netanyahu would go ahead and build there now, finally, 20 years on, if he gets back into power? And do we expect any substantial change to Israel's policy of settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories? Will Palestinians notice a difference, do we think, if there's a change in government or not?

His party had launched a new election campaign just last week.

Internationally, Britain's Foreign Minister, Ed Miliband, has warned companies and individuals considering bids for Israel's E1 West Bank settlement project.

miliband stated that those involved in the construction risk legal and reputational consequences including potential sanctions warning against involvement in serious breaches of international law the deadline for bids was monday the idf has revealed an internal hamas document reportedly from april 2024 detailing a plot by the group's engineering department according to the idf The plan proposed planting explosive devices around displaced person camps in Gaza and detonating them as Israeli troops approached.

The IDF asserts the explosions were intended to create civilian panic and provide a smokescreen for Hamas operatives to escape, even with the acknowledged risk to civilians.

Area C under Oslo remained under Israeli administration, and that's where these, you know, so-called settlements, Jewish communities are being built.

What's extraordinary to me is that no one's actually talking about the real illegal building in Area C. I was there a couple of months ago and saw in E1 what was being done with international community support.

Many of these porter cabins that pop up in the middle of nowhere in pursuance of the two thousand and nine Fayyad plan of creating facts on the ground and, and creating essentially a de facto Palestinian state.

These are strategically placed illegally in Israeli-administered territory in Area C to prevent Israeli building.

Maybe the fact that it's endorsed by the international community and funded by the European Union makes it even more politically sensitive.

But that's the reality of what's happening on the ground.

The flip side of this is what the international media is, uh, uh, are promoting with respect to, um, what they claim is illegal settlement building, which is, is not because there's no law against Jews building homes according to proper planning application and zoning laws and the, um, the, uh, tender that was put out now, of course, for the proposed building in, in A-Area E1.

This is an extension of, uh, Jerusalem suburbs, and it's the land between Jerusalem and Ma'ale Adumim.