Israeli lawmakers on Wednesday voted to advance two proposed bills that call for the formal annexation of the already Israeli-occupied West Bank, an ambition openly promoted by far-right ministers in recent months but opposed by President Trump.
The vote by Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, came with Vice President JD Vance visiting Israel to shore up the Gaza ceasefire that was brokered by Mr. Trump’s administration. The president has made clear he would not back annexation of the West Bank.
“I will not allow Israel to annex the West Bank,” Mr. Trump told reporters at the White House in September. “It’s not going to happen.”
Israeli media reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had called on lawmakers from his Likud party to abstain from voting. In a statement, the party called the votes “another provocation by the opposition aimed at damaging our relations with the United States.”
“True sovereignty will be achieved not through a showy law for the record, but through proper work on the ground,” it added.
During a preliminary reading on Wednesday, lawmakers voted in favor of examining two bills, which means they will be brought forward for further readings in the Knesset. The first text, passed by a vote of 32-9, proposed annexing Maale Adumim, a large Israeli settlement home to some 40,000 people just east of Jerusalem.
The second proposal to annex the entire West Bank was supported by 25 members, while 24 voted against. Almost all the lawmakers from Netanyahu’s Likud party boycotted the vote, with one voting in support of the measure, according to Israeli media. The Knesset has 120 members in total.
Far-right members of Netanyahu’s Cabinet have openly called for annexation of the West Bank, which has been occupied by Israel since 1967.
“Mr. Prime Minister. The Knesset has spoken. The people have spoken,” Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich posted on social media.
“The time has come to impose full sovereignty over all of Judea and Samaria — the inheritance of our ancestors — and to promote peace agreements in exchange for peace with our neighbors with strength,” he said, using the Israeli Biblical term for the West Bank.
In a statement, the Ramallah-based Palestinian foreign ministry condemned the Knesset’s vote, saying it “strongly rejects the Knesset’s attempts to annex Palestinian land.”
“The ministry emphasized that the occupied Palestinian territories in the West Bank, including Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, constitute a single geographic unit over which Israel has no sovereignty,” it said, as reported by Palestinian official news agency Wafa.
Jordan’s foreign ministry also said it “strongly condemned” the votes, which it called “a blatant violation of international law and a grave undermining of the two-state solution.”
All of Israel’s settlements in the West Bank are widely considered illegal under international law, but Israel disputes that and Netanyahu’s government has supported their expansion.
In August, Israel approved a major civilian settlement project between Maale Adumim and Jerusalem in an area of the disputed territory that the international community has warned threatens the viability of a future Palestinian state.
At a signing ceremony for the project in September, Netanyahu vowed that there would be no Palestinian state. The 20-point Middle East peace plan put forward by the U.S. recognizes that there may be a “credible pathway” for Palestinian statehood after the Palestinian Authority, which has limited autonomy in some parts of the West Bank, undergoes reforms.
“We are going to fulfill our promise that there will be no Palestinian state, this place belongs to us,” Netanyahu said at the event in Maale Adumim.
Excluding Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, the West Bank is home to around 3 million Palestinians, as well as more than 500,000 Israelis living in settlements.
Since the war in Gaza began in October 2023, violence has also surged in the West Bank, with Palestinian residents describing escalating attacks by Israeli settlers. Some attacks on Israelis, by knife- or gun-wielding Palestinians, have originated from the territory.
Vance met with Netanyahu on Wednesday as the fragile ceasefire deal in Gaza continues to hold between Israel and Hamas, which is designated a terrorist organization by the U.S.
“We have a very, very tough task ahead of us, which is to disarm Hamas but rebuild Gaza to make life better for the people in Gaza, but also to ensure that Hamas is no longer a threat to our friends in Israel. That’s not easy,” Vance told reporters. “There’s a lot of work to do, but I feel very optimistic about where we are.”