During his term as US ambassador to Israel between 2001 and 2005, Daniel (Dan) Kurtzer spent time trying (and failing) to devise ground rules for limiting West Bank settlement construction. His efforts, at the time, were to minimize Israeli facts on the ground of the West Bank in order to maximize prospects for a two-state Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.

Donald Trump’s Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, in contrast, will represent the United States on a joint US-Israeli committee that will  help the Israeli government create the most consequential facts on the ground of the West Bank since Israel captured it in 1967: defining the areas in the West Bank that will be annexed by Israel.

Ambassador Kurtzer, who today is a professor at Princeton University is the guest of this episode.

Ambassador Kurtzer’s bio: https://wws.princeton.edu/faculty-research/faculty/dkurtzer

Ambassador Kurtzer’s 2010 American Interest article: https://www.the-american-interest.com/2010/03/01/behind-the-settlements/

Dan Rothem’s rendering of Trump’s map: https://centerpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/From-Peace-to-Prosperity-Recreation-with-population.pdf