Israel’s Smotrich calls for ‘war’ in West Bank: Rhetoric or real threat?

Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has called for a full-scale war in the occupied West Bank, urging the military to use the tactics employed in Gaza, which has been devastated by the ongoing genocide.

Smotrich, known for his inflammatory, racist and dehumanising language against Palestinians, also called for the annexation of southern Lebanon and Gaza’s territories under Israeli control.

The minister told Ynet News in an interview published on Sunday that Israel should “go to war” in the occupied territory and repeat what it “did in Gaza”. His comments come about a month ahead of the general election, which has seen a surge in Israeli and settler violence in the occupied territories, as well as the demonisation of Palestinian citizens of Israel.

During the Ynet News interview, Smotrich said that Israel should “do there what we did in Gaza” in response to a question on how Israel should combat the increasing “security tensions” in the occupied West Bank.

So what did the minister – who has been sanctioned by a number of Western countries along with his Cabinet colleague Itamar Ben-Gvir – say, and should it be taken seriously or regarded as just election rhetoric?

What did Smotrich say about the occupied West Bank?

In his trademark incendiary style, Smotrich said he has “solutions” to the ongoing pogroms in the occupied West Bank. Since Israel launched its ongoing genocidal war in Gaza, it has stepped up its crackdown in the West Bank, arrested thousands—many of them without any formal charges—and looked the other way as settler pogroms continue in the West Bank.

“I think we need to go to war in Judea and Samaria, to do there what we did in Gaza, to dismantle the Palestinian Authority, which is a terror authority,” he told Ynet News, referring to the biblical name for the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority governs the West Bank following the Oslo Accords.

Israeli forces have “cleared out” Palestinian refugee camps in the West Bank and he added: “We need to tell the [Israeli military]: Just as you dismantled Hamas in Gaza, there won’t be terror infrastructure in Judea and Samaria. No terrorists, no weapons, no tunnels”.

That’s alarming rhetoric, warned Suhad Bishara, the legal director of Adalah – the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel.

“Smotrich is not only proposing a ‘war’ on Palestinians in the West Bank, he is already waging one,” Bishara told Al Jazeera.

“The refugee camps he boasts of having ‘cleared out’ have been destroyed and their residents forcibly displaced.”

“His call to ‘do there what we did in Gaza,’ where Israel has carried out a genocidal campaign of mass killing, starvation and destruction, is a public declaration of intent to commit war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide against Palestinians in the West Bank,” she said.

Smotrich additionally pushed to annex the territory the Israeli military controls in Gaza, demarcated by the so-called “Yellow Line”, where the Israeli army withdrew to under the first phase of the Gaza “ceasefire”. Israeli military maps indicate the line extends 1.5km and 6.5km (0.9 to 4 miles) inside Gaza from its eastern boundary with Israel and covers roughly 58 percent of the enclave.

Since the “ceasefire” took effect, Israeli attacks have killed at least 1,408 Palestinians. At least 74,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel since October 2023, according to the enclave’s health ministry, with much of the besieged territory reduced to rubble.

Legal scholars and campaigners have dubbed Israel’s military actions in Gaza a genocide. A UN commission of inquiry panel last September said that Israel committed genocide in Gaza.

What were Smotrich’s remarks about Lebanon?

The leader of the far-right Religious Zionism party also called for annexing southern Lebanon.

“I would very much like to annex at least up to the “Yellow Line” in Gaza and up to the Litani [River] in Lebanon,” said Smotrich.

He added that annexing parts of Gaza and Lebanon would make Israel’s enemies “pay a price” for the Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023.

Israel continues to occupy southern Lebanon and Israeli shelling and demolitions have also continued there, despite a US-brokered “ceasefire” in June.

Smotrich’s call to annex the West Bank, parts of Gaza and southern Lebanon is a “declared plan to seize occupied land by force and make its theft permanent, which is absolutely prohibited under international law,” said Bishara.

Last week, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, speaking at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, demanded a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanese territory up to its internationally recognised border.

Israeli attacks in southern Lebanon have killed at least 4,386 people and wounded 12,407 since March 2, when the current Hezbollah-Israel war started. Since then, Israeli forces have occupied up to 600sq km of Lebanese territory up to the Litani River.

How have Palestinian authorities responded?

The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the Israeli politician’s comments are an “explicit invitation to escalate the aggression and commit more crimes against our Palestinian people”.

They “reveal the truth of the Israeli plans aimed at implementing attempts at annexation and displacement”, the ministry said in a statement, adding that it would undermine the possibility of establishing an independent Palestinian state.

The threats are a translation of the policies pursued by the Israeli government “of killing, displacement, settlement, and land confiscation and an attempt to impose a new reality by force on the occupied Palestinian land”, it also said.

The ministry urged the international community to take action against Israel’s “aggression”.

The far-right leader has a long history of inflammatory statements about Palestinians, followed by policies and actions reflecting his hardline positions as a key member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government since 2022.

He has previously called on Israel to annex more than 80 percent of the West Bank. Smotrich along with Netanyahu has publicly opposed the so-called two-state solution. Settlement expansion is the biggest hurdle in the realisation of a sovereign and independent Palestinian state living side by side with Israel.

In July, Smotrich said Israel has launched a “revolution in settlement” expansion, after the Israeli cabinet approved the establishment of 13 new illegal settlements in the central occupied West Bank. That followed June’s announcement of 2,162 new Jewish homes in a new illegal settlement near Jerusalem.

In campaigning for next month’s election, he has promised yet more expansions of Israeli settlements in the territory.

“Settler violence, carried out under army protection, is driving entire communities from their land and settlement expansion under his authority has reached unprecedented levels,” said Bishara.

In May, Smotrich said the ⁠⁠⁠⁠International Criminal ⁠⁠⁠⁠Court (ICC)  had ⁠⁠⁠⁠requested a warrant for his arrest. The ICC’s accusations centre on the minister’s forced displacement orders for Palestinians, his support for moving Israeli settlers into occupied territory and his claim it may be “justified and moral” to starve Palestinians in Gaza.

Last September, before the “ceasefire” in Gaza, Smotrich said there was a “business plan” to turn the Strip into a “real estate bonanza”, stating that he had been discussing with the Trump administration how to share the proceeds.

In March, he also threatened to turn the southern suburbs of Lebanon’s capital into another Gaza Strip.

Smotrich’s words should not be dismissed as mere election rhetoric, warned Bishara.

“They are a warning and states must take concrete, immediate measures to halt the assault on Palestinians and the commission of egregious crimes against them,” she said.

Analysts agreed with the human rights lawyer’s assessment.

“[Smotrich’s comment is] very much a reflection of what he has been doing in the West Bank for the last four years and what he would like to continue to do if he stays in power,” Mairav Zonszein, an analyst on Israel-Palestine at the International Crisis Group, told Al Jazeera.

“Him and this government and the settler movement that he funds and resources … they are at war in the West Bank.”

She explained that Smotrich and his allies have used settlement expansion and settler violence not only to expand their control, but also to provoke a Palestinian response.

“And any response by Palestinians is met with even more ferocious force,” said Zonszein.

Smotrich is not just gearing up for next month’s election – he has a calculated vision of wanting to continue his expansionist policies, she said.

“It’s the government’s vision, and it’s what they’ve been doing, and this is what they will continue to do as long as they’re in power.”

Yossi Mekelberg, a senior fellow on Israel-Palestine at Chatham House, said that while Smotrich’s comments may be a part of his election campaign, “what is now rhetoric, tomorrow may be policy”.

“We are exactly a month from the election … If this is the tone … and this is what’s presented to the voters and if someone like him on the basis of this ideology will be elected again, he might find it as [an] endorsement of this kind of attitude,” Mekelberg told Al Jazeera.