NIF's CEO, Daniel Sokatch
NIF's CEO, Daniel SokatchHadas Parush, Flash 90

New Israel Fund CEO Daniel Sokatch said that if Netanyahu acts on his pledge to apply Israeli sovereignty over Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria if re-elected, “it may be the end of Israel as we know it.”

In an opinion piece published in Ha’aretz following the Israeli elections, Sokatch called on "Israel’s true friends, all of those who want to see Israel fulfill its founding vision of being both a Jewish homeland and democratic state - including the leaders of the American Jewish community - to say, loud and clear, that an Israel that ceases to be a democracy, one that permanently disenfranchises and rules over another people, will lose the support of the American Jewish community, the family of democracies and the free world.”

According to Sokatch, “A move to annex the occupied territories would corrode Israel’s international standing, rupture its relationship with the American Jewish community and likely extinguish any remaining chance for a two-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians. And it could very well mark the beginning of end of Israel as a democratic state.”

“Netanyahu’s hubris stands in stark contrast to the pragmatism and wisdom of virtually all of his predecessors, left, right and center over the last half century,” Sokatch wrote.