‘Greater Israel' vision: Brief exchange on Israeli TV revives Arab concerns over expansion
Without appearing clearly on screen, the interviewer from Israel's i24NEWS handed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu an amulet, saying it depicted 'Greater Israel' and 'the map of the Promised Land.' When asked whether he felt connected to the vision of Greater Israel, Netanyahu replied, 'Very much.'
That brief exchange, lasting less than half a minute, was enough to spark a wave of strongly worded Arab condemnations. After all, the Greater Israel vision threatens the security — and even the existence — of many of those countries.
The term 'Greater Israel' is not new in Zionist political and religious literature. Its roots go back to biblical interpretations and ancient texts describing the 'Promised Land,' which the Israelites claim they were promised.
According to those accounts, it stretches from the Nile River in Egypt in the west, through Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria, to the Euphrates River in Iraq in the east, extending into northern Saudi Arabia and southern Turkey.
This vision goes beyond Israel's current borders to encompass large parts of several countries.
In biblical texts, the 'Promised Land' is not presented as an unconditional 'gift,' but rather as contingent on a set of religious and moral obligations, such as obeying the law and keeping covenants.
However, in modern Zionist political readings, the spiritual dimension has been sidelined, and the concept has been reframed as a nationalist settler project — invoked to justify territorial expansion or sustain the notion of a 'historical right,' even if the original biblical conditions are not met.
The reappearance of this concept in a public interview on an Israeli TV channel, even in a clip lasting just seconds, revives a sensitive question: Is this vision an active element in the mind of Israel's decision-makers, or merely an ideological symbol summoned for domestic purposes?
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