Thousands of Palestinians rally against annexation of settlements and the Jordan Valley

Several thousand people demonstrated on Monday, June 22, in Jericho, in the occupied West Bank, against the American plan for the Middle East, lambasted by the Palestinian leadership.

This is the largest rally in the West Bank since the announcement in late January of President Donald Trump's project, when previous protests had gathered dozens or a few hundred protesters.

Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party, head of the Palestinian Authority (PA), had called for a massive mobilization despite the restrictions linked to the coronavirus in Jericho, an Arab city at the southern tip of the Jordan Valley, near the sea Dead, in the West Bank.

"No Palestinian State without the Jordan Valley", "Palestine is not for sale", "the Trump plan will never pass", "international law is clear, we are here in Palestine", could we read on signs.

The plan of the American administration provides for the annexation by Israel of the Jewish colonies and the Jordan Valley, a vast agricultural plain, in the West Bank, and the creation of a Palestinian state on a reduced territory.

For its part, the Palestinian Authority says it has rallied international support against the project, while the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must announce from July 1 its strategy to implement the American plan.

"I came here to protest the annexation because there will be no more land for a Palestinian state if Israel annexed," one of the demonstrators Mohammed Ichloon, 48, who came from the camp, told AFP. refugees from Aqabat Jaber, located at the edge of town.

"We will not let Israel steal our land," said Kamal Said, an employee of a Christian NGO living in the same camp.  

"You are not tenants here, this is your home"

And the UN envoy for the Middle East, Nickolay Mladenov, spoke to criticize the Trump plan while calling on the Palestinians to peacefully oppose it.

"You are not tenants here, this is your home," Nickolay Mladenov told the Palestinians, calling on diplomats not to "waste a second, a minute or an hour" to act against the proposed annexation.

Today, I joined #EU, #Russia, #China, #Japan, #Jordan to express support to the #Palestinian people. My message was simple— do not stray away from the path of non violence, do not lose hope for a Palestinian state living side-by-side and in peace with #Israel.

"The UN believes that annexation is against international law (...) And if it does happen, it will kill the idea that peace and a state for the Palestinians can be achieved through negotiations," he said. he said, urging the Palestinians "not to stray from the path of non-violence". 

"Do not lose sight of the objective of a free Palestinian state, on this earth, and alongside Israel (...) aligned on the borders of 1967", called into question by the project of annexation, a he added.

In the wake of the occupation of the West Bank in 1967, Israel established or legalized a network of settlements there, illegal under international law. Today, more than 450,000 people live in settlements in the West Bank, a number that has increased by almost 50% in the past decade, according to Israeli data.

European and Middle Eastern countries have warned against annexing parts of the West Bank by Israel without announcing any concrete measures. Chinese and Russian officials also spoke on Monday at the Jericho rally, an AFP team said.

"We now have with us a broad international coalition against the Israeli plan to annex land in the West Bank", made up of "Arab countries, non-aligned countries, Africa and Europe," said Monday at AFP Secretary General of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Saëb Erakat.

"No country is outside of this coalition, except Israel and the United States," he said.

With AFP

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