MK Yuli Edelstein (Likud) on Sunday blasted Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who during a press conference with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken referred to the territories of Judea and Samaria as “the West Bank”.
"Naftali, when you speak in English and abroad - your words carry weight. It's not like saying that you’re a rightist and then sitting with the Islamic Movement, Lapid and Meretz," Edelstein said.
He added, "When you call the territories of Judea and Samaria using Palestinian terminology and narrative - it has political significance. Again and again you prove that this is too big on you."
The chairman of the Religious Zionist Party, MK Bezalel Smotrich, was even harsher with his criticism of Bennett. "It is time we all realize it, day by day it becomes clearer that Bennett and Shaked joined the left not as a tactical move but as a full adoption of the policy and even the terminology of the left. This is reflected in the loss of governance in the Negev, systematic destruction of settlement, in the construction freeze, in the loss of deterrence in the face of terrorism, in the harming of the Jewish identity of the state, and more and more."
"Every day more and more people sober up and understand that they have been deceived by the right-wing false charms of Yamina and the polls in which Yamina barely scratches the electoral threshold show this," Smotrich said.
The Prime Minister's spokesman, Matan Sidi, responded to the criticism in a conversation with Israel National News and said, "Usually the Prime Minister uses the term 'Judea and Samaria', both in Hebrew and in English. This is a coincidental statement, and no special significance should be attributed to it."
MK Yomtob Kalfon (Yamina) explained, "The term ‘West Bank’ is common and unfortunately Netanyahu and other Prime Ministers used it many times. In my Hebrew conversations with the Prime Minister, the common term, always, is Judea and Samaria. In my opinion, this is an excessive and political attack."