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Senior Israeli Official: Repealing Disengagement Law Did Not Violate Deal with U.S.
(Times of Israel) Amy Spiro - A senior Israeli official on Friday rejected a U.S. assertion made last week that Israel violated commitments it made to the U.S. by voting to repeal parts of the 2005 Disengagement Law that had ordered the evacuation of four northern West Bank communities. "There was no violation of any commitment," the official told reporters who accompanied Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on his diplomatic visit to London. "If anything, there was a violation" on the U.S. side of an agreement made between then-president George W. Bush and then-prime minister Ariel Sharon regarding construction in settlement blocs. "They can't come and force us to stay committed after they essentially abandoned the policy that Bush said...in exchange for the disengagement, they were supposed to accept unrestricted building in the settlement blocs." Asked if the U.S. is interfering too much in Israel's current domestic policies, the official said, "no more than usual....There has been blatant interference in the past."