WASHINGTON, D.C. – Following Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the United States last week, U.S. Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt.) joined U.S. Senators Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in issuing the following statement in response to the Israeli Higher Planning Council’s directive on June 18 to reject all zoning and building permits in Masafer Yatta that are not compliant with Israeli military training needs: 

“We are deeply alarmed by the Israeli Higher Planning Council’s decision to reject all planning and zoning requests in Masafer Yatta that do not align with the Israeli Defense Force’s training needs. This directive places at least 12 Palestinian villages under the threat of imminent demolition – all while illegal Israeli outposts in the area remain untouched. 

“For decades, the Israeli government has denied residents of Masafer Yatta building permits, confiscated their agricultural lands, and demolished key infrastructure. Taken as a whole, the Council’s decision as well as the recent announcement of 22 new settlements across the West Bank, rising extremist settler violence, and a petition from cabinet ministers urging Netanyahu to apply Israeli sovereignty and law over the West Bank before the end of the month, advance a broader project of de jure and de facto Israeli annexation aimed at preventing the formation of a future Palestinian state. Forced evictions, demolitions, settler violence, and rapid settlement expansion all exacerbate tensions in an already volatile region and put any peaceful future for Israelis and Palestinians further out of reach. 

“With the ceasefire between Israel and Iran still tenuous and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza already dire, the Netanyahu government’s continued reckless policy in the West Bank is deeply alarming. The Masafer Yatta directive is part of that trajectory, one that pushes us further from a future Palestinian state living peacefully alongside the state of Israel and toward permanent occupation. 

“We refuse to look away from the injustice unfolding in Masafer Yatta and the escalating violence in the West Bank at large, which has now claimed the lives of five Palestinian Americans since October 7. To ensure lasting peace and stability in the region, we call on the Israeli government to revoke the Higher Planning Council’s directive, impose an immediate moratorium on all demolitions and evictions, halt further military training exercises in Masafer Yatta, and take immediate action to de-escalate the growing violence in the West Bank.” 

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