Israel PM says Jewish people cannot be occupiers in their homeland

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday that the Jewish people cannot be considered occupiers in their historic homeland, in response to a decision by the World Court saying Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are a breach of international law.

“No false decision in The Hague will distort this historical truth, just as the legality of Israeli settlement in all the territories of our homeland cannot be contested,” Netanyahu said.

“The Jewish people are not occupiers in their own land -- not in our eternal capital Jerusalem, nor in our ancestral heritage of Judea and Samaria” (the occupied West Bank), Netanyahu said in a statement.

“No decision of lies in The Hague will distort this historical truth, and similarly, the legality of Israeli settlements in all parts of our homeland cannot be disputed.”

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The ruling has drawn added attention because it comes against the backdrop of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
Netanyahu led a chorus of condemnation from conservative, far-right and even centrist politicians in Israel.

In the English-language version of his statement, Netanyahu called the decision “absurd,” instead of “lies” as he said in the Hebrew version.

Itamar Ben Gvir, the far-right national security minister and a settler himself, called the ICJ “a blatantly anti-Semitic and political organization.”

In comments sent to AFP by a spokesperson, Ben Gvir called for annexation of the occupied territories.

Centrist opposition leader Yair Lapid said the court’s ruling was “disconnected, one-sided, tainted with anti-Semitism and lacking an understanding of the reality on the ground.”

The ICJ ruling comes in response to a UN General Assembly query in 2022 regarding the legal consequences of Israel’s “prolonged occupation, settlement and annexation of the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967.”

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In the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel occupied the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including east Jerusalem which it swiftly annexed.

The UN later declared the occupation of Palestinian territory illegal.

A separate ICJ case brought by South Africa alleges that Israel’s Gaza offensive, launched after the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, breached the 1948 UN Genocide Convention. Israel has strongly denied the accusation.

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