For over half a century, the Israeli presence in Judea and Samaria has been managed through a "temporary" military framework that has long since outlived its strategic purpose. The Civil Administration-a branch of the Ministry of Defense originally designed as a caretaker body after the 1967 Six-Day War-now functions as an archaic, bureaucratic bottleneck.
This bifurcated legal system, which places hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens under military decrees while Palestinian counterparts operate under a mix of Ottoman, British, Jordanian, and Palestinian Authority (PA) law, has created a governance vacuum. In the Middle East, such vacuums are inevitably filled by radicalization. As Israel navigates the post-"Swords of Iron" regional landscape, the transition from military administration to civilian "Administrative Sovereignty" is no longer an ideological luxury; it is a fundamental security requirement.
The primary driver of the ongoing conflict is not a dispute over borders, but rather the Palestinian Arab rejection of Jewish indigenous sovereignty. For decades, the international community has preserved the "Green Line" as a diplomatic waiting room, signaling to the Palestinian Arab leadership that the Jewish presence in their ancestral heartland is reversible. This perception of transience is the oxygen that feeds the flames of the "resistance" narrative.
As long as the territory is governed as a military occupation-in-waiting, the PA and its patrons in Tehran have every incentive to maintain a state of "eternal war," hoping that international pressure or internal fatigue will eventually force an Israeli retreat. By normalizing the legal and administrative status of these regions, Israel effectively removes the "Two-State" mirage from the table, forcing a recalibration of Palestinian Arab expectations that is the prerequisite for any long-term stability.
The Security Cabinet’s recent decisions to repeal Jordanian-era land restrictions and transfer municipal powers in Hebron represent the first meaningful steps toward this normalization. These reforms are not "annexation" in the traditional sense of international law, but rather the application of professional governance to a territory where military improvisation has failed.
Under the previous regime, Israeli residents were treated as second-class citizens, subject to the whims of military commanders for basic civil needs like water permits or cell tower placement. This dysfunctional system didn't just hurt Israelis; it created a lawless frontier in Area C that allowed for rampant illegal construction and environmental degradation, often funded by European actors seeking to undermine Israeli security through "facts on the ground."
From a strictly military perspective, a professional civilian administration allows the IDF to return to its core mission: neutralizing threats. When military officers are forced to act as urban planners, sewage engineers, and property lawyers, their operational focus is diluted. Shifting these civilian responsibilities to the relevant Israeli ministries-Education, Health, Transport, and Energy-professionalizes the management of the territory and reduces the daily frictional points between the population and the military. Security is enhanced when the legal reality on the ground matches the strategic reality of permanent settlement.
A unified legal framework also provides the certainty necessary for large-scale infrastructure projects that benefit all residents of the region, creating a stable environment that discourages the chaos necessary for terror cells to thrive.
Critics of administrative sovereignty argue that such moves will alienate the international community or trigger a collapse of the Palestinian Authority. However, this argument ignores the fact that the PA has already functionally collapsed as a security partner, increasingly serving as a paymaster for terror and a diplomatic agitator. By entrenching administrative sovereignty, Israel signals that the era of concessions is over. This clarity is a better stabilizer than the fragile, corrupt "security coordination" of the Oslo years.
For U.S. policymakers under the Trump 2.0 administration, supporting Israeli administrative sovereignty in Judea and Samaria aligns with the broader goal of regional stability through strength. The "Two-State Solution" is a 20th-century relic that has consistently produced more violence and Iranian encroachment. A sovereign Israel, controlling the high ground of the Judean ridges and the Jordan Valley, is the only reliable bulwark against the "Shiite Crescent" stretching from Baghdad to the Mediterranean.
Washington should view the dismantling of the Civil Administration not as an obstacle to peace, but as the removal of a strategic ambiguity that has long invited aggression. Supporting "Legal Normalization" allows the United States to pivot away from crisis management and toward a regional architecture built on the success of the Abraham Accords-an axis of stable, sovereign states that prioritize economic integration and security over outdated nationalist fantasies.
Amine Ayoub, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is a policy analyst and writer based in Morocco. Follow him on X: @amineayoubx