In an interview with Haaretz, Trump’s Israel affairs advisor David Friedman agreed with Bibi Netanyahu’s assertion that the removal of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, a demand the PA and State Department make amounts to ethnic cleansing.
Below are Friedman’s comments:
“Prime Minister Netanyahu makes exactly the right point. The Palestinians want Israel to absorb countless ‘refugees’ – people who never lived in Israel and whose ancestors were never forced to leave Israel – while their so-called ‘state’ is required to be, as the Nazis said, judenrein (devoid of Jews). It is an entirely racist and anti-Semitic position.”
“Arabs live and work side by side with Israelis in the State of Israel. They attend universities, enjoy the strongest human and civil rights (including women’s rights) in the region, and have access to world class health care. There is no better place for Arabs to live in the Middle East than in the State of Israel. With this background in mind, the Prime Minister of Israel correctly observes that the Palestinian demand to remove all Jews from their ancestral homeland in Judea and Samaria is nothing short of an attempt at ethnic cleansing. The State Department should be ashamed of their misguided reaction to Mr. Netanyahu’s remarks.”
“The United States frequently refers to the ‘two state solution’ as two states for two peoples. The Palestinian response – which the U.S. State Department refuses to challenge – is ‘one state for two peoples (Israel) and a second state just for Palestinian Arabs.’ It is no wonder that the State Department under Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have lost credibility in the region.”
