The Media Line: Lapid Pushes Knesset Vote on President Trump’s Gaza Plan, Tightening Political Pressure on Netanyahu  

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Lapid Pushes Knesset Vote on President Trump’s Gaza Plan, Tightening Political Pressure on Netanyahu  

By Gabriel Colodro/The Media Line  

Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid said on Tuesday that he will bring to the Knesset next week a resolution calling for Israel to “receive and adopt the 20-point plan of the president of the United States, Donald Trump.” The announcement immediately stirred tensions across the political spectrum, not least because the framework under discussion is the same one that ended the Gaza war after more than two years of fighting.  

Lapid released the move publicly, writing that his party “supports President Trump and strengthens his hand in the efforts to implement the stages of the plan.” He added that he expects all parliamentary factions to vote in favor.  

The 20-point plan was crafted by the US president and accepted by Israel and Hamas in the final stages of the cease-fire negotiations. Afterward, the UN Security Council approved the blueprint, giving the agreement international legitimacy and locking in the broader diplomatic contours of the postwar phase.  

Not all of those contours sit comfortably within Israel’s governing coalition. The proposal envisions transferring administrative responsibility in Gaza to a reformed Palestinian Authority and opening a political track that could, over time, support Palestinian self-determination. Coalition figures on the hard right quickly made clear they want nothing to do with several of these provisions. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir have both stated that they will not back any arrangement that shifts authority in Gaza toward the Palestinian Authority or opens even a narrow political horizon for the Palestinians.  

For Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the timing is awkward. Israel has already informed Washington that it accepts the American president’s plan, and the government has been operating on that basis since the cease-fire took effect. Turning around now and voting it down in parliament would be difficult to explain to the US administration, yet supporting it outright risks triggering another disagreement inside his own coalition.  

Lapid’s initiative pushes the issue directly into the parliamentary arena. If the resolution reaches the plenum, every faction will have to cast a public vote on a plan Israel has effectively been following for over a month. That alone could reveal where the real pressure points are — less in diplomatic forums and far more within the coalition’s narrow majority.  

The coming days will show whether the government tries to delay the vote, negotiate changes behind the scenes, or confront the debate head-on. Either way, Lapid has ensured that the political consequences of President Trump’s postwar framework will now be debated on the Knesset plenum.