PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP has said that Israel will lose US backing if the occupied West Bank is annexed. 

In a interview with Time Magazine published today, Trump affirmed that the annexation “won’t happen”. 

“It won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries. Israel would lose all of its support from the United States if that happened.” Trump said. 

US Vice President JD Vance also said today that Israel would not move to annex the occupied West Bank, after Washington warned that such a step could jeopardise a fragile US-brokered truce in Gaza.

Israeli lawmakers advanced two bills yesterday paving the way for West Bank annexation, days after President Donald Trump secured a ceasefire deal aimed at ending Israel’s two-year assault on Gaza.

“If it was a political stunt it was a very stupid political stunt and I personally take some insult to it,” Vance said, as he wrapped up his three-day visit to Israel.

“The West Bank is not going to be annexed by Israel, the policy of the Trump administration is that the West Bank will not be annexed by Israel, that will continue to be our policy.”

The vote was boycotted and criticised by Likud, the party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, although far-right members of his ruling coalition support annexation.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, and violence there has surged over the past two years. 

Washington’s top diplomat, Marco Rubio, warned that annexation moves were “threatening” for the peace deal. 

“We’re concerned about anything that threatens to destabilise what we’ve worked on.” Rubio said.

The Palestinian Authority exercise limited self-rule in parts of the West Bank.

According to the Ramallah-based Palestinian health ministry, Israeli troops and settlers have killed nearly 1,000 Palestinians in the West Bank since October 2023. 

Over the same period, at least 43 Israelis, including members of the security forces, have been killed in attacks or during Israeli operations, official figures show.

The United States remains Israel’s primary military and diplomatic supporter, and Rubio until recently had steered clear of criticising annexation moves championed by Netanyahu’s far-right allies.

A number of Arab states, which Washington has been courting in a bid to provide troops and money for a stabilisation force in Gaza, have warned that the West Bank’s annexation was a red line.

Trump also told Time that he believed Saudi Arabia would join the Abraham Accords, which normalise relations between Israel and Arab states, by the end of the year.

“See they had a problem. They had a Gaza problem and they had an Iran problem. Now they don’t have those two problems,” he said, referring to Israel’s war on Gaza and Iran’s nuclear programme, which US airstrikes targeted earlier this year.