Americans for Peace Now (APN) today issued the following response to the White House's statement on Israeli settlements in the West Bank:

While some may view it as positive that President Trump is paying attention to the Israeli government's aggressive settlement construction push, the statement issued yesterday by the White House should be understood for what it is: a dangerous and unprecedented retreat from and reframing of longstanding bipartisan U.S. policy on settlements, including under presidents George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

This week, Alpher discusses the completion of the Amona evacuation, which occurred with relatively little violence, and its significance; the upcoming meeting between President Trump and PM Netanyahu and possible agenda items; and the bottom line regarding US-Israel relations in the Middle East context in the Trump era.

Please join APN for a briefing call with strategic affairs expert Yossi Alpher on US-Israel relations, days before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s first meeting in Washington with Donald Trump as President.

Yossi Alpher, an independent security analyst, is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with Israel’s Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. He is the author of Hard Questions Tough Answers, APN’s weekly analysis of Israeli and Middle Eastern strategic affairs.

The details of the call are as follows:

Date: Thursday, February 9th
Time: 12:00 PM (Eastern Time)
Dial-in Number: 951-797-1058
Participant Access Code: 147414

The call will be recorded. The audio recording will be posted on APN’s website.

Americans for Peace Now today issues the following statement in the wake of the Israeli Knesset's passage of legislation legalizing illegal settler construction on private Palestinian land:

The more Netanyahu hitches his wagon to the White House, the more he and Trump resemble each other, the more American Jews will actively resist both.

Israel’s newly adopted, patently unconstitutional “Regularization Law” further distances most American Jews from the government of Israel and the State of Israel. 

It does so by further underscoring the similarities between Israel’s leadership and U.S. President Donald Trump’s campaign of constitutionally controversial executive orders. It thus further deepens the sense of dissonance in the minds of American Jews regarding the U.S.-Israel relationship.