Israel’s Jordan Valley Annexation explained
Israel is set to seize one-third of the occupied West Bank, despite international condemnation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he will begin to annex a third of the already illegally occupied West Bank, including parts of the strategic Jordan Valley, in line with US President Donald Trump’s controversial so-called “Middle East plan”.
The plan, announced in January, proposes to establish a demilitarised Palestinian state on a patchwork of disjointed parts of the Palestinian territories.
This does not include occupied East Jerusalem, which the Palestinian Authority (PA) claims as the capital of a state it seeks.
Trump’s Middle East plan has been largely met with scepticism and was rejected by Palestinian leaders, but Israel has taken it as a show of support for its plans to seize and extend its sovereignty over the occupied land.
Annexing the Jordan Valley would mean that Israel would officially consider it part of its state.
“International law is very clear: Annexation and territorial conquest are forbidden by the Charter of the United Nations,” said Michael Lynk, the UN independent expert on human rights in the Palestinian territories.
The West Bank is seen as occupied territory under international law, making all Jewish settlements there – as well as the planned annexation – illegal.
The United Nations and the European Union say the plans threaten the possibility of reaching a peace agreement in the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Arab countries have also warned the planned annexation could affect security in the region.
To understand what annexation will look like on the ground and how we got here, Al Jazeera’s Interactive Editor Mohammed Haddad explains how these annexation plans will affect Palestinians.
This report was produced and edited by Al Jazeera NewsFeed’s Seena Khalil and Katya Bohdan.