Thread by @AnshelPfeffer

Netanyahu is on. Immediately name-checks Donald Trump and predicts that the Trump Deal will be presented "immediately after the election. Perhaps even days. It's a great challenge, also a great opportunity. A historic opportunity."

Right off Netanyahu is saying this is an opportunity to extend Israeli sovereignty to "critical parts" of "Judea and Samaria" and "parts that are key to our history... The question is who will negotiate with Trump, who will conscript him on our side, me or Lapid and Gantz"

Netanyahu: "I am asking you to give me the mandate to extend Israeli law to all the settlements. Out of respect for Trump, I am waiting to do this in maximum coordination with Trump. But there is one place where the diplomatic circumstances are ripe to do this very soon"

Netanyahu: "If I am elected I commit to annex the Jordan Valley. It is our eastern border, our defense wall."

Now Netanyahu showing a map titled "Israeli sovereignty in Jordan Valley and Northern Dead Sea" with a wide blue area. Makes a big deal out of not "annexing even one Palestinian". Jericho and the Palestinian villages will remain enclaves.

Netanayahu ends in an appeal to voters, "give me the mandate. No previous Israeli prime minister has proposed doing so. Give me the strength to decide Israel's eastern border."

Netanyahu has no plan. Except a map that child could have drawn. It's a blatant play for right-wing voters. He's saying that only I can get Trump to go along with annexation. I need Likud to be the biggest party in the next Knesset. An act of desparation.

From the number of times he mentioned coordination with Trump and "respect for President Trump," he left himself a get-out clause. He can play for time as long as he's "waiting for Trump" and of course, if he is forced to form a national-unity coalition, he'll blame his partners.

If Netanyahu wins next Tuesday, and that's a big "if", he will be spending all his time trying to tailor his immunity from prosecution. Not annexing the Jordan Valley.

If Netanyahu’s statement proves anything, it’s his contempt for his own right-wing voters' intelligence. They are expected to believe that after all this time, the “historic opportunity” to annex the Jordan Valley is suddenly just a week before the election.