Yair Lapid, the leader of Israel’s opposition, said a peace agreement with Palestinians would not be the priority of his bloc if it won elections later this year and that Israel has bigger domestic issues and tensions with Iran to deal with.
“There will be no two-state solution in the coming years,” Mr Lapid said during a press conference in Jerusalem on Monday. “Right now, this is not the most important thing and we have to move on with other issues.”
He also vowed that there would be no annexation of the occupied West Bank, which remains a priority of many in the current ultranationalist government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
A number of its ministers, many of whom are settlers, have spent recent weeks trying to cram through land-grabbing legislation in the eventuality that parliament is dissolved, bringing elections closer than the current October date.
His comments come amid widespread anger at Mr Netanyahu following reports that the US was close to a peace deal with Iran that would be disadvantageous to Israel.
Mr Lapid said the reports meant that “first, this will not be the last round of war, second, that Netanyahu has failed to achieve even one of the war’s objectives that he defined”.
He also accused Mr Netanyahu of “losing the ear” of the Trump administration, amid reports that Israel had been largely frozen out of negotiations with Iran.
Mr Lapid announced an alliance with Naftali Bennet in April. Both were prime ministers during Israel’s previous government. Mr Lapid is a centrist whose Yesh Atid party is viewed as one of Israel’s most sophisticated and experienced political campaigning outfits. Mr Bennet, who served in an elite military unit, is on the right wing and a former leader of the settler movement, but has been critical of the current government.
That has expanded or legalised a record number of settlements in the West Bank, which most of the international community deems illegal.
There has also been a surge in settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied territory, leading to record numbers of killings and displacement. Mr Lapid called the violence “Jewish terrorism” and blamed the current government, in particular National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, a radical settler and convicted criminal.
