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By Supporting Putin’s Land Grab, Trump Is At Least Being Consistent
Trump’s insistence that it was in fact the Ukrainians who started the war with Russia, and that the fighting would end if they simply gave up, echoes the long-standing position of both U.S. political parties toward Palestine.
Mar 12, 2025
In the aftermath of U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance’s attacks on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the White House last Friday, a number of United States lawmakers, world leaders, and political commentators have expressed outrage at their defense of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as well as their victim-blaming rhetoric toward Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian resistance effort.
Their stance, however, is not unique: For decades, the United States has held similar positions regarding military conquests and occupations by Morocco and Israel.
The critical response to Trump’s willingness to allow Russia to annex parts of Ukraine has centered on the dangerous precedent of allowing a country to hold onto lands seized by military force. Former President Joe Biden, citing the “rules-based international order,” repeatedly noted the illegitimacy of any nation unilaterally changing international boundaries and expanding territories by force during his presidency. But in practice, the United States has not only tolerated similar illegal irredentism by allied governments, but has formally supported them.
In certain respects, Trump’s support for Russia’s war and occupation creates an opportunity for those who believe that Palestinians, Syrians, and Western Saharans have as much right to resist foreign conquest as Ukrainians to advocate for the self-determination of all occupied peoples.
Trump’s insistence that it was in fact the Ukrainians who started the war with Russia, and that the fighting would end if they simply gave up, echoes the long-standing position of both U.S. political parties toward Palestine. And every presidential administration since 1993 has insisted that the Palestinian Authority allow Israel to annex large swathes of the West Bank territory seized in the 1967 war as part of any potential peace agreement, and has then blamed the Palestinians for their alleged failure to compromise.
During the first Trump administration, the U.S. also became the first and only country to formally recognize Israel’s 1981 annexation of the Golan Heights—which had been condemned and declared “null and void” by the United Nations Security Council—as part of Israel, in a decision that Biden later upheld. In the past few months, Israel has seized additional Syrian territory and has vowed to remain there, and has maintained occupation forces in southern Lebanon in defiance of its cease-fire agreement.
Similarly, in 2020, the United States became the first country to formally recognize Morocco’s annexation of the entire nation of Western Sahara, a full member state of the African Union, in defiance of the United Nations and the International Court of Justice in 1975. Biden upheld that decision as well.
During the Biden administration, these endorsements of illegal annexations by Israel and Morocco hurt the U.S.’s credibility in marshaling support for Ukraine, particularly among the Global South. At the United Nations, the U.S. was repeatedly called out over its support for Morocco and Israel’s takeovers by critics who argued that the U.S. opposed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine out of geopolitical interests rather than principle, in a move they called hypocritical. Now, the U.S. is showing consistent support for territorial conquests, including those of Russia.
Opposition to ongoing U.S. military support for Ukraine is not limited to Kremlin apologists, however. Pacifists, neorealist international relations experts, and others have argued that while Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is unjustified, the prospect of extending a potentially unwinnable war of attrition in the hopes of recovering the 19% of Ukrainian territory under Russian control is simply not worth the human and financial costs. The likely possibility of additional casualties in the tens of thousands—and the risk, however remote, of nuclear exchange—has led even some of the most bitter critics of Russia’s actions to call for a negotiated settlement.
The strongest argument against such a compromise is that it would reward Russia’s aggression and tempt Russian President Vladimir Putin to engage in further territorial expansion, endangering the Baltic Republics and other areas once controlled by the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. However, given how the U.S. has formally recognized illegal annexations of territories seized by force by Morocco and Israel, allowing Russia's illegal expansionism to remain in place, at least temporarily, would not establish a precedent: The precedent has already been set. And like Russia, Israel and Morocco have expressed expansionist ambitions beyond their current occupied territories as well.
In any case, Trump’s opposition to supporting Ukraine is neither pacifist nor utilitarian. He is supporting Putin and blaming Ukraine for the war. He is siding with an authoritarian aggressor against a democracy fighting for its very survival. The backlash against Trump’s support for Russia’s invasion, occupation, and illegal annexation of Ukrainian territory is therefore quite appropriate.
The denial of agency to the Ukrainians, including the false charge that the 2014 Maidan uprising was a U.S. coup and that Ukrainians are simply fighting a proxy war rather than defending their nation from a foreign invasion, runs parallel to claims that Palestinian, Lebanese, and Syrian resistance to the Israeli occupations is a proxy war on behalf of Iran and that the Western Sahara struggle against the Moroccan occupation is a proxy war on behalf of Algeria. No one under foreign military occupation needs to be forced by a foreign power to defend their homeland.
In addition to his consistent support for the occupying forces of Israel, Morocco, and now Russia, Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire for the United States to become an occupying power in its own right, as exemplified by his plan to forcibly relocate all remaining Palestinians in Gaza and annex it as U.S. territory. Similarly, his recent threats to seize Greenland, Panama, and even Canada harken back to the U.S. expansionism of the late-19th century.
In certain respects, Trump’s support for Russia’s war and occupation creates an opportunity for those who believe that Palestinians, Syrians, and Western Saharans have as much right to resist foreign conquest as Ukrainians to advocate for the self-determination of all occupied peoples. To allow any of these illegal occupations to become permanent puts the entire post-World War II international legal order in jeopardy and seriously threatens international peace and security. Uniting the international community to force an end to these occupations, preferably through nonviolent means, is imperative. The “rules-based international order” must be upheld regardless of the geopolitical orientation of the parties involved.
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Netanyahu Shows Map of 'New Middle East'—Without Palestine—to UN General Assembly
"Netanyahu made clear with his little map today what normalization really seeks: eliminating Palestine... from the region and legitimizing greater Israel, all with the blessing of Arab regimes," one critic said.
Sep 22, 2023
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu angered Palestinians and their defenders Friday after presenting a map of "The New Middle East" without Palestine during his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
Speaking to a largely empty chamber, Netanyahu—whose far-right government is widely considered the most extreme in Israeli history—showed a series of maps, including one that did not show the West Bank, East Jerusalem, or Gaza. These Palestinian territories have been illegally occupied by Israel since 1967, with the exception of Gaza—from which Israeli forces withdrew in 2005, while maintaining an economic stranglehold over the densely populated coastal strip.
Middle East Eye reported Netanyahu also held up a map of "Israel in 1948"—the year the modern Jewish state was established, largely through the ethnic cleansing of more than 750,000 Arabs—that erroneously included the Palestinian territories as part of Israel.
Palestinian Ambassador to Germany Laith Arafeh said on social media that there is "no greater insult to every foundational principle of the United Nations than seeing Netanyahu display before the UNGA a 'map of Israel' that straddles the entire land from the river to the sea, negating Palestine and its people, then attempting to spin the audience with rhetoric about 'peace' in the region, all the while entrenching the longest ongoing belligerent occupation in today's world."
As Middle East Eye noted:
The inclusion of Palestinian lands (and sometimes land belonging to Syria and Lebanon) in Israeli maps is common among believers of the concept of Eretz Yisrael—Greater Israel—a key part of ultra-nationalist Zionism that claims all of these lands belong to a Zionist state.
Earlier this year, Netanyahu's finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, spoke from a podium adorned with a map that also included Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria as part of Greater Israel. In the same event, he said there was "no such thing as Palestinians."
The use of such maps by Israeli officials comes at a time when Netanyahu's ultra-nationalist government has taken steps that experts say amount to the "de jure annexation" of the occupied West Bank.
Netanyahu used the maps in an attempt to illustrate the increasing number of Arab countries normalizing relations with Israel under the Abraham Accords brokered by the administration of former U.S. President Donald Trump.
"There's no question the Abraham Accords heralded the dawn of a new age of peace," the Israeli prime minister said. "But I believe that we are at the cusp of an even more dramatic breakthrough, an historic peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia will truly create a new Middle East."
Critics have countered that peace between apartheid Israel and Arab dictatorships has come at the cost of advancing Palestinian rights. In the case of Morocco, the United States recognized the North African nation's illegal annexation and brutal occupation of Western Sahara in exchange for normalization with Israel.
Netanyahu's props on Friday reminded numerous observers of the time during his 2012 General Assembly speech when he used a cartoon drawing of a bomb to illustrate Iran's progress on advancing a nuclear weapons program that both U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies said did not exist.
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Biden's Continuation of Trump's Western Sahara Policy Is Deeply Troubling
Trump recognized the wholesale annexation of one country by another. If Biden lets that stand, the global implications are deeply troubling.
Jan 22, 2022
In his final weeks in office, President Donald Trump stunned the international community in formally recognizing Western Sahara as part of Morocco. Morocco has occupied much of its southern neighbor since 1975, when it invaded and annexed the former Spanish colony in defiance of the United Nations Security Council and a landmark ruling of the International Court of Justice.
Biden's failure to rescind Trump's recognition of the Moroccan conquest will not only prolong the bitter conflict in Western Sahara, but will also contribute to undermining the liberal international order in place since the end of World War II.
Most observers believed that, as with some of Trump's other impetuous foreign policy decisions, President Joe Biden would reverse it soon after coming to office. However, much to the disappointment of bipartisan congressional leaders, career State Department officials, major U.S. allies, North Africa scholars, and the human rights community, he has refused to do so.
The Biden administration has not explicitly reconfirmed Trump's recognition, either. However, unlike maps from the United Nations, National Geographic, Rand McNally, Google, or pretty much anywhere else, official U.S. government maps under the Biden administration all show Western Sahara as part of Morocco with no delineation between the two. U.S. embassy officials travel to the occupied territory and treat it as part of the kingdom. State Department reports referencing the territory no longer list it as a separate entity.
Biden administration officials have repeatedly refused to answer press queries regarding the U.S. recognition. In response to direct questions from reporters, they pivot to vague statements in support of the "peace process." For example, Secretary of State Antony Blinken dodged a series of questions from a BBC reporter by saying that the United States is focused on supporting the efforts of United Nations envoy Staffan de Mistura to work with "all the parties involved... to find a durable and dignified solution" so that "process can move forward."
The problem is that the process has not actually been going forward.
For the Moroccans, the U.S. recognition has only solidified their insistence that self-determination is out of the question. If the world's number one superpower insists that Western Sahara is part of Morocco and blocks the United Nations from enforcing its resolutions, why should they even consider compromising? To the Moroccans, U.S. recognition means the issue has been resolved in their favor and they have no incentive to adhere to their international legal obligations.
As with Israel and Palestine, the United States insists that the two parties work it out between themselves even as the occupying power categorically rules out the option of a viable independent state. Furthermore, it ignores the great asymmetry in power between the occupier and those under occupation as well as the moral and legal responsibility of occupying powers to allow the people of the conquered lands the right of self-determination.
Tragic U.S. Hypocrisy
This contrasts with the U.S. reaction to the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in which the Iraqis--like the Moroccans--put forward the dubious historical claim that their small southern neighbor was historically part of their country that had been severed by colonial machinations and that they were only correcting a historical injustice. The United States did not insist that the Kuwaitis engage in an endless "peace process" with the Iraqis, but insisted that Iraq end their occupation, even going to war less than six months later to reverse it.
The Biden administration, however, in refusing to rescind Trump's recognition, is taking the position that the expansion of territory by force--notwithstanding such prohibitions in the UN Charter--is not necessarily illegal after all and can be an acceptable form of statecraft.
As a result, the White House's opposition to Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea and more recent threats against Ukraine's territorial integrity is insincere. If the administration really believed that "any use of force to change borders is strictly prohibited under international law," it would have annulled Trump's recognition. Indeed, the Biden administration's hypocrisy only serves to strengthen Russia's authoritarian leader Vladimir Putin, who can correctly argue that U.S. opposition to his aggressive moves towards Ukraine is more political than principled.
On an even grander scale than the Israelis in their occupied territories, the Moroccans have been colonizing Western Sahara with many tens of thousands of settlers. As with their ally Israel, successive U.S. administrations have been facilitating the occupying power's creation of facts on the ground by dragging out the negotiation process indefinitely, thereby making a reversal of the occupation increasingly difficult.
Biden's support for the Moroccan occupation is even more controversial than his support for the Israeli occupation. In addition to the outspoken opposition by leading congressional liberals like Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN), and others, U.S. recognition of the Moroccan conquest has upset some prominent conservatives, such as Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) and former National Security Advisor John Bolton, as well as prominent State Department veterans.
On the one hand, Biden's opposition to long-standing international legal principles is not new. He was an outspoken supporter of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, he has defended successive right-wing Israeli governments when they have violated international law, and he has criticized the United Nations, the World Court, and other institutions when they've raised concerns about violations of international law by the United States and its allies.
At the same time, recognizing the takeover of one entire independent country by another is a virtually unprecedented action by a major power in modern times. Even the administrations of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, notorious for their violations of international legal norms, refused to go as far as Trump--and now Biden--when it came to the Moroccan occupation.
Out of Step With International Law
Western Sahara--formally known as the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR)--has at one time or another been recognized by 84 countries and is a full member state of the African Union. The Biden administration is effectively recognizing the invasion, occupation, and annexation of one recognized African state by another, thereby harming U.S. relations with much of the continent.
The AU has long held that colonial boundaries, as arbitrary as some of them may be, must not be altered unilaterally. The SADR currently governs roughly one-quarter of Western Saharan territory and about 40 percent of the population, mostly in Polisario-administered refugee camps in western Algeria.
Western Sahara is recognized by the United Nations, the World Court, the African Union, and a broad consensus of international legal scholars as a non-self-governing territory. As a case of incomplete decolonization, Western Sahara must therefore be allowed to engage in an act of genuine self-determination. That is why no major country had recognized Morocco's control over Western Sahara until Trump's announcement a little over a year ago.
There would be no problem if the Sahrawis chose incorporation into Morocco in an internationally supervised referendum. However, as a non-self-governing territory, they must also have the opportunity to choose independence, which Morocco has categorically ruled out. The United States is effectively agreeing with the Moroccan monarchy that the indigenous population of Western Sahara--known as Sahrawis, and who embrace a distinct history, dialect, and culture from their northern neighbor--should not even be given that chance.
Instead, the United States and France have endorsed a Moroccan "autonomy" plan for Western Sahara that is quite limited in scope and would fail to meet the international standard for autonomy. It does not allow the Sahrawis the option of independence--to which they are entitled as a U.N.-recognized non-self-governing territory according to international law, a series of U.N. resolutions, and a landmark World Court ruling.
A Human Rights Nightmare
Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and other reputable investigative groups have documented widespread arrests, the torture of dissidents, and violent suppression of peaceful protests by Moroccan authorities in Western Sahara.
Freedom House, in its survey of 210 countries, has ranked Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara as having the worst record on political rights in the world save for Syria. This raises serious questions regarding how much "autonomy" would mean in practice as well as whether the Biden administration's rhetoric in support of human rights and democracy is at all sincere.
Traditionally, Sahrawi women have had more rights than their Moroccan counterparts, having equal rights to inheritance and divorce, keeping their maiden names, and being trusted in positions of leadership. They are particularly visible in the leadership of the nonviolent resistance movement in the occupied territories and have been specifically targeted for sexual abuse by Moroccan occupation forces.
Indeed, the Biden administration's apparent belief that Western Sahara should be governed by a foreign, autocratic, right-wing monarchy instead of a relatively progressive and secular republic says a lot about its priorities.
The Polisario Front, the leading nationalist movement which initially emerged in the anti-colonial struggle against Spain, engaged in an armed struggle against Moroccan occupation forces until agreeing to a 1991 cease fire in return for a referendum on independence. Morocco never followed through, however. After 29 years of broken promises, continued occupation, and a series of Moroccan violations of the cease fire, the Polisario resumed the war in the fall of 2020.
Morocco's allies in Congress keep insisting without evidence that the Polisario has links to Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, and other terrorist groups even though the Polisario has never engaged in terrorism and is decidedly secular in orientation. Regardless, the Biden administration's failure to support the right of the people of Western Sahara to self-determination is contributing to the destabilization of the region.
Bigger Stakes for the 21st Century
The implications of the Biden administration's policies go well beyond the fate of the half million Sahrawis living in exile or under repressive military rule. Biden's failure to rescind Trump's recognition of the Moroccan conquest will not only prolong the bitter conflict in Western Sahara, but will also contribute to undermining the liberal international order in place since the end of World War II.
As a result, the stakes are not simply about the future of one small country, but the question as to which principle will prevail in the 21st century: the right of self-determination, or the right of conquest?
The answer could determine the fate not just of the Western Sahara, but that of the entire international legal order for many decades to come.
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