White House Mulling Sanctions On Hardline Israeli Ministers Smotrich & Ben-Gvir

The White House has over the last several months imposed a series of sanctions against small Israeli settler groups accused of committing human rights abuses against Palestinians and of stealing land. These are so limited (largely amounting to restrictions on travel to the US) that they are largely seen as merely symbolic.

There are new reports in Israeli media saying the Biden administration is mulling a big next step: sanctioning top Israeli government ministers who are known to encourage and support radical settler groups in the West Bank.

The Jerusalem Post reports that Biden’s National Security Council held a meeting days ago to discuss strategies to thwart expanding Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

Among the plans reportedly discussed was the possibility of sanctions on hardline and outspoken Netanyahu coalition ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir. Not only have these two officials frequently made incendiary remarks seen as exacerbating the Gaza crisis, but they openly encourage Israelis to move in on Palestinian land.

The two actually oversee Israeli government policy in Judea and Samaria, where some of the most extreme settler groups have a significant presence.

Ben-Gvir and Smotrich have also regularly denounced the ‘weakness’ of Biden administration policy on the Gaza crisis in the wake of the Oct.7 terror attacks on southern Israel. 

The have both claimed that Biden is ‘helping Hamas’:

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich stated bluntly that the strong American opposition would only reinvigorate Israel’s drive to eliminate Hamas.

“We must continue this war until victory, despite, and to a certain extent precisely because of, the opposition of the administration Biden and the stopping of arms shipments,” he said in a statement. “We simply have no other choice that does not endanger our existence and security.”

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, a firebrand who leads the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, tweeted simply that “Hamas [loves] Biden.”

With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expected in Washington next week, where he’ll address Congress and likely meet with President Biden, the US will more than likely not trigger a full-on diplomatic crisis with its closest regional ally by sanctioning its top ministers at this time.

Relations have already been tense of late…

Israeli PM lashes out at the US

The White House cancelled a high-level meeting with Israeli officials after Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a video accusing the US of withholding weapons to Israel. Senior advisers to US President Joe Biden are said to be… pic.twitter.com/SAEMe6HMqF

— Middle East Monitor (@MiddleEastMnt) June 19, 2024

A possible future Trump administration would also surely reverse any possible sanctions. Trump’s team has vowed to given Israel whatever it needs to eradicate Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in the ongoing Gaza operations.