Nir Barkat, the former mayor of Jerusalem who is now a member of Knesset with the Likud party, is seeking to outlaw the planned reopening of a US diplomatic mission in Jerusalem to the Palestinians.
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Israel's new cross-partisan government led by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett also opposes the reinauguration of the consulate, potentially buoying Barkat's effort to scupper the move, though it would strain relations with Washington.
The consulate was subsumed into the US Embassy that was moved to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv in 2018 by then-US President Donald Trump, steps hailed by Israel and condemned by Palestinians.
US President Joe Biden's administration has said it will reopen the consulate while leaving the embassy in place.
In August, Israel Hayom reported that the Biden administration was working behind the scenes to persuade Israel to reopen the consulate for the Palestinians.
Barkat's bill, which he filed in the Knesset last month and with voting as yet unscheduled, would outlaw opening a foreign mission in Jerusalem without Israel's consent.
"I think that the current Israeli government is weak. It relies on the left, it relies on radicals on our side," he told Reuters. "We must do everything we can to maintain the unity of the city of Jerusalem."
Ahmed Al-Deek, adviser to the Palestinian Authority foreign ministry, said Barkat "represents the position of far-right parties in Israel which seek to block any chance of reaching a two-state solution."
Barkat said polling showed nearly 70% public support for the bill – enough to garner votes from within the coalition. Asked for Bennett's position, his spokesman cast the bill as a PR stunt, saying: "We don't comment on trolling."
US officials have been largely reticent on the issue, saying only that the reopening process remains in effect.
Asked whether precedent existed in US diplomacy for opening a mission over objections of a host country, the State Department's Office of the Historian declined comment.
Barkat's bill recognizes that there are a handful of countries with Jerusalem missions, like the former consulate, that predate Israel's founding in 1948.
In what may signal a bid to persuade Israel to reconsider the former mission as a candidate to rejoin that group, Thomas Nides, Biden's pick for ambassador to Israel, noted in his Sept. 22 confirmation hearing: "That consulate has existed, in one form or another, for almost 130 years."
Barkat was unmoved, saying: "We respect what happened before 1948 [but] never did we give anybody consent to open up a diplomatic mission for Palestinians in the city of Jerusalem."
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