Recently, the Knesset voted 71-13 in favor of a resolution calling on the government to “apply Israeli sovereignty, law, judgment and administration to all the areas of Jewish settlement of all kinds in Judea, Samaria and the Jordan Valley.” The declaration went on to state Judea and Samaria are “an inseparable part of the Land of Israel, the historical, cultural and spiritual homeland of the Jewish people” and that “Israel has the natural, historical and legal right to all of the territories of the Land of Israel.” This is an incredible turn of events. 

Around 2000 BCE, God Almighty initiated an eternal covenant with Abraham, promising three things: descendants (through his son Isaac), land, and that the whole world would be blessed through him. After Abraham’s descendants were enslaved in Egypt, the Nation of Israel entered the Promised Land (the land promised to Abraham) approximately 600 years later. We can trace the history of the land from King David’s reign, to the Babylonian invasion of 586 BCE, Persian rule, through the Hellenistic (Greek) Period, the Hasmonean Period, the Roman era, the Byzantine Period, and Ottoman Rule until the end of World War I (after which international law repeatedly granted the Jewish people political sovereignty over the land known as Palestine). These laws included the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the 1920 San Remo Resolution, and later the July 1922 British Mandate for Palestine with the express purpose of helping establish a home for the Jewish people from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. While this mandate was agreed upon by the League of Nations (which was ultimately replaced by the United Nations), the land remained contested. 

On November 29, 1947, the United Nations approved the partitioning of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states, with 56% of the land going to a Jewish State and 43% to an Arab State. On May 14, 1948, the day the British Mandate in Palestine expired, the State of Israel was established under the presidency of David Ben-Gurion, with the backing of the United States under President Harry Truman. 

The Arabs did not accept the UN's partitioning of the land to receive their Arab State. Instead, they declared war on the new State of Israel, leading to the Arab-Israeli War of 1948-1949, which Israel miraculously won. After another miraculous victory (the Six-Day War in 1967), Israel conquered Jerusalem, the Golan Heights, Sinai, Judea, and Samaria. 

The Oslo Accords (officially called the “Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements”) between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) recognized Israel’s right to exist, and Israel recognized the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people. The accords also established the Palestinian Authority to govern Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.  

The October 7, 2023, attack by Hamas has brought clarity that the “land for peace” deals have not worked. There is proof that not only the Gaza governance of Hamas but also the Palestinian Authority in parts of Judea and Samaria have stirred hatred toward the Jewish people. Terrorist attacks in Judea and Samaria occur frequently.   

God gave the land of Judea and Samaria to the Jewish people. We celebrate the steps to declaring sovereignty over the land, and as we do so, may we reflect on God’s words to Abraham in Genesis 13:14: “‘Look around from where you are, to the north and south, to the east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.’”