Republicans in the House and Senate are finalizing legislation that would formally recognize the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria,” applying Israel’s official term for the region to all American government communications, according to a copy of the bill obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
Led by Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and Rep. Claudia Tenney (R., N.Y.), the Recognizing Judea and Samaria Act would prohibit government use of “West Bank” when referencing the territories around Jerusalem. Israel, which annexed the area in 1967, refers to it as the biblical Judea and Samaria, though the United States and international community avoid this term, viewing the region as home to a future Palestinian state.
The bill from Cotton and Tenney, then, would upend decades of U.S. foreign policy and is reminiscent of the Trump administration’s first-term push to recognize both Jerusalem and the Golan Heights territory near Lebanon as belonging to Israel. Congressional Republicans widely supported those declarations after pushing—and failing—for years to formalize similar policies through legislation.
While it is unlikely that the Senate version of the bill will clear the 60-vote threshold needed for approval in the upper chamber, congressional sources argued that its unveiling could influence the Trump administration to champion the policy, particularly at Foggy Bottom. Cotton, who chairs the Senate Republican conference, worked closely with Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the Senate, and the two share similar views on foreign policy.
“The Jewish people’s legal and historic rights to Judea and Samaria goes back thousands of years,” Cotton told the Free Beacon. “The U.S. should stop using the politically charged term West Bank to refer to the biblical heartland of Israel.” […]
— Read More: freebeacon.com
