Originally published in Tikkun Daily

Israel's Prime Minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has just appointed a man to represent Israel on the international stage who rejects Palestinian statehood and wants to annex most of the West Bank. The move simply confirms that Netanyahu's true geo-political goal is for Israel to gain sovereignty over the West Bank and create a 'Greater Israel.'

Yes, Netanyahu recently tried to backtrack from statements indicating that he wants to occupy the Palestinians indefinitely; however, this appointment shows Israel's current leader has always rejected and will continue to reject any peace agreement which grants Palestinians a sovereign state.

Lest anyone question the extremist politics of Danny Danon, the man who will now diplomatically represent Israel, he has explicitly rejected the two-state solution, remarking when he was Deputy Defense Minister that he would go so far as to block Palestinian statehood if it were to come up for a vote. This is also a man who has expressed a desire for Israel to “gain sovereignty over the majority of the [West Bank] ... "with the minimum number of Palestinians" as possible. As for the Palestinians themselves? Danon would rather Jordan figure out their 'status' rather than Israel burden itself alone with such matters.

Just to reiterate, Israel's new U.N. ambassador, the country's highest-ranking diplomat, is a one-stater who cares little about the rights of Palestinians, and certainly doesn't think such rights should be Israel's concern. Indeed, the only thing which differentiates Danon from those proponents of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement who seek a bi-national, democratic state, is that the latter seem to be the only ones who care about democracy.

[Sigh.]

There is a reason that veteran Israeli analysts and hundreds of security experts have stated that Netanyahu is a danger to Israel. There's a reason that the IDF just yesterday broke from Netanyahu by rejecting the notion that Iran's nuclear capability is a credible threat to Israel. And that reason is because Netanyahu, along with an increasingly right-wing government, are pushing Israel towards a precipice.

In the United States, nearly every major Jewish and pro-Israel organization is explicitly a proponent of the two-state solution. However, among these, J Street has been the only one so far to critique Netanyahu's appointment, much less his past statements rejecting Palestinian statehood. All that exists is a mostly deafening silence among Jewish leaders invested in Israel – making them complicit not just in the brutal oppression and subjugation of Palestinians, but in Israel's self-destruction.

If nothing else, the veil has been lifted even more with Danon's appointment – a veil which has tried, through public relations campaigns, to mask the Israeli government's true intentions.

Now those intentions are being represented at the U.N., in plain sight, for all to see. Some might call that chutzpah. I call it honesty.

What you see is now what you're getting, and it's not something the international community, the United States government, or global Jews invested in Israel want to see.

It may be too late to save Israel or the two-state solution. Perhaps it was too late a decade ago. History will decide that issue.

For now, the only thing I can do is continue to be a pro-pressure American Jew hope has finally been lost.

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David Harris-Gershon is author of the memoir What Do You Buy the Children of the Terrorist Who Tried to Kill Your Wife?, recently published by Oneworld Publications.

Follow @David_EHG

