Trump, Israel, and the Battle Over the West Bank: A Shift in U.S. Policy
It’s 2024, and with Donald Trump back in the Oval Office, a familiar dynamic is unfolding in U.S.-Israel relations. His return has reinvigorated right-wing lawmakers both in Israel and the United States—especially those who support Israeli annexation of the West Bank. This contentious territory, home to millions of Palestinians, has long been seen by the international community as part of a future Palestinian state. But to Israel’s right-wing government and many of its allies in Washington, it’s Judea and Samaria—an ancient, biblical land that belongs to the Jewish people.
And now, Republicans in Congress are pushing a bold new proposal to reflect that belief directly in U.S. policy.
Rewriting the Map: The “Judea and Samaria” Bill
On Friday, Republican lawmakers introduced legislation that would eliminate the term “West Bank” from all U.S. government documents, replacing it with “Judea and Samaria”—a term commonly used by Israeli officials and settlers. The proposal, spearheaded by Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Representative Claudia Tenney of New York, is more than just a linguistic shift. It’s an explicit endorsement of Israel’s territorial claims over the region, which has been under Israeli military occupation since the 1967 war.
Senator Cotton framed the bill as a correction of historical injustice. “The Jewish people’s legal and historic rights to Judea and Samaria go back thousands of years,” he said. He also argued that calling it the West Bank was itself a “politically charged” designation—an assertion that critics were quick to turn on its head. Opponents of annexation say it’s actually "Judea and Samaria" that comes loaded with political implications, signaling a clear push towards formal Israeli sovereignty in the area.
The Politics of Annexation: Netanyahu and Trump’s Tightrope Walk
The timing of this move is no coincidence. Just days later, Trump met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington—Trump’s first official meeting with a foreign leader since returning to power.
At a press briefing leading up to the visit, reporters pressed Trump on whether he would support Israeli annexation of the West Bank. His answer was, as usual, characteristically vague—but suggestive. “It certainly is a small country in terms of land,” he said, before offering an analogy: “My desk is the Middle East. And this pen, the top of the pen, that’s Israel. That’s not good, right?”
It wasn’t an outright endorsement of annexation, but Trump’s comments didn’t leave much room for optimism among opponents of Israeli expansion. His administration has consistently given cover to Israel’s far-right ambitions, and his willingness to entertain the idea of formalizing Israel’s hold over the West Bank has energized settlers and Israeli officials who favor such a move.
Settlements, Sovereignty, and the Palestinian Struggle
Since capturing the West Bank in 1967, Israel has allowed hundreds of thousands of Jewish settlers to move into the territory—despite fierce resistance from Palestinians and near-universal opposition from the international community. These settlers live under Israeli civil law, enjoying the full rights of citizenship, while millions of Palestinian residents remain stateless and subject to Israeli military rule.
For Palestinians, the expansion of settlements is a methodical process of creeping annexation—a slow but steady erasure of their prospects for statehood. Every new settler home built reduces the land available for a potential Palestinian state, fragmenting territory into a patchwork that increasingly resembles an unsolvable puzzle.
And now, with Trump’s return, the settler movement feels like it has a powerful friend in Washington once again.
Israel’s far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, himself a settler and outspoken opponent of Palestinian statehood, is among those celebrating recent developments. When Trump’s administration erased a long-standing U.S. stance that Israeli settlements were illegal in 2019, Smotrich saw it as a monumental breakthrough. Now, with Trump back, he’s pushing harder than ever for full sovereignty over Judea and Samaria. As Netanyahu traveled to Washington for talks with Trump, Smotrich took to social media, calling Trump “a lover of Israel” and declaring, “We must strengthen our grip and sovereignty over the homeland in Judea and Samaria.”
The Global Backlash: Legal and Diplomatic Fallout
But while Israeli right-wing leaders and their Republican allies in the U.S. are celebrating, others are raising serious concerns about the implications. There’s a reason past U.S. administrations—both Democratic and Republican—have resisted outright annexation: It’s a diplomatic nightmare.
The international community overwhelmingly views Israeli settlements in the West Bank as illegal under international law. The United Nations, European allies, and even many in Washington argue that annexation would not only kill the prospects for a two-state solution but would also poison Israel’s relations with its Arab neighbors.
Even some pro-Israel voices in Washington are uneasy about the road Israel is heading down under Trump’s renewed influence. Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of J Street, a prominent pro-Israel advocacy group, warned that the real danger here isn’t just what words the U.S. government uses—it’s the policy shift those words represent.
“What’s dangerous about this proposal isn’t what they want to call the land; it’s the proposal to affirm Israeli sovereignty over it,” he said. And in his view, that amounts to de facto annexation—which doesn’t just violate international law, but wrecks any hope for Israel to normalize diplomatic ties with Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Arab states.
The Long Road Ahead: What Comes Next?
The battle over the terminology of the West Bank is just a glimpse into the wider ideological fight raging over the future of the region. Trump’s return to power has emboldened Israeli expansionists and their Republican allies, but it has also reinvigorated opposition. Democrats, progressive Jewish organizations, and international legal experts are warning of the long-term consequences of unconditional U.S. support for Israeli annexation.
For Netanyahu, balancing the demands of his far-right coalition with Israel’s broader interests is proving trickier than ever. He knows that annexing the West Bank outright would provoke international outrage—but he also knows that Trump, his most supportive U.S. president in history, might be willing to let it happen.
And for Palestinians, the nightmare of occupation continues. With every policy shift, every new settlement announcement, the reality of an independent Palestinian state seems to fade even further into the distance.
One thing is certain: the next few years will shape the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in ways that will be felt for generations.
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In short, Trump’s second term is already proving to be a game-changer for the Israeli right, the settler movement, and their vision for the West Bank. Whether it leads to full annexation, a diplomatic crisis, or an intensified conflict remains to be seen. But for now, the battle over words—West Bank vs. Judea and Samaria—is just the beginning of a much bigger struggle.
