Tourism Minister Yariv Levin said on Wednesday that a cabinet vote to endorse annexation of parts of Judea and Samaria will not take place early next week, despite Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's pledge a day earlier to act quickly after the US released a peace plan rejected by the Palestinians.
Netanyahu said he would ask the cabinet to advance the extension of Israeli sovereignty over most Jewish settlements and the strategic Jordan Valley.
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Levin told Israel Radio that a cabinet vote on annexing territories on Sunday was not technically feasible because of various preparations, including "bringing the proposal before the attorney general and letting him consider the matter."
Some on the Right have called for the immediate annexation of Judea and Samaria settlements ahead of the country's third parliamentary election in under a year, scheduled for March 2.
Levin, a member of Netanyahu's Likud party, said the Palestinian state envisioned by the Trump peace plan is "roughly the same Palestinian Authority that exists today, with authority to manage civil affairs," but lacking "substantive powers" like border control or a military.
Defense Minister Naftali Bennett tweeted Wednesday that "that which is postponed to after the elections will never happen."
"If we postpone or reduce the extension of sovereignty [in Judea and Samaria], then the opportunity of the century will turn into the loss of the century," said Bennett, a co-leader of the New Right party.
