Bennett: Hebron’s Tomb of Patriarchs must be part of US sovereignty map
All West Bank settlements are slated to become part of sovereign Israel under Trump’s peace plan, but according to the map, the status of Jewish Hebron is unclear.
By TOVAH LAZAROFFNAFTALI BENNETT: Trump plan is a ‘key issue in the campaign’(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)Hebron's Jewish community and the Cave of the Patriarchs must be part of sovereign Israel as defined by the Trump administration's peace plan, said Defense Minister Naftali Bennett at an inauguration ceremony for a new neighborhood in the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba on Sunday.All West Bank settlements are slated to become part of sovereign Israel under Trump’s peace plan, but according to the map, the status of Jewish Hebron is unclear.Bennett said that a Jewish state without the Tomb of the Patriarchs is like Washington, D.C. without the Lincoln memorial. The defense minister also spoke against the portion of the Trump plan that calls for the creation of a Palestinian state.He noted that the plan speaks 159 times of a Palestinian state and references Israeli sovereignty" only 13 times.“I strongly oppose the giving of an even one inch of land to the Arabs,” Bennett said.He explained that he has authorized an elevator project for the Tomb of the Patriarchs to make it accessible for people with disabilities, but the project now needs the approval of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
