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The 1977 Likud Platform: "Between the Sea and the Jordan"

In May 1977 Menachem Begin, the former commander of the Irgun underground, led the Likud party to its first election victory, ending three decades of Labor rule. He ran on a short written platform. Its first section is the clearest statement of the narrow Greater Israel ever written by a party that went on to govern: all the land from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River, under Israeli sovereignty only. It is still the document critics and supporters alike point to when they call Likud's program by its name.

The text​

The Jewish Virtual Library, a pro-Israel reference site, prints the platform. Its section "The Right of the Jewish People to the Land of Israel" reads:

"The right of the Jewish people to the land of Israel is eternal and indisputable and is linked with the right to security and peace; therefore, Judea and Samaria will not be handed to any foreign administration; between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty."

The next sentence: "A plan which relinquishes parts of western Eretz Israel, undermines our right to the country, unavoidably leads to the establishment of a 'Palestinian State,' jeopardizes the security of the Jewish population, endangers the existence of the State of Israel and frustrates any prospect of peace."

On settlement: "Settlement both urban and rural in all parts of the Land of Israel is the focal point of the Zionist effort to redeem the country." (Jewish Virtual Library; older address)

Three words need explaining. "Judea and Samaria" are the biblical names Israeli officials use for the West Bank. "Western Eretz Israel" means the Land of Israel west of the Jordan River, a phrase that assumes there is also an eastern one (see Jabotinsky and "Both Banks"). "Sovereignty" means Israeli law and rule, not just military control.

What Begin said in power​

On 20 June 1977, presenting his government to the Knesset, Begin spoke of "the historic, eternal and inalienable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel," and quoted Jabotinsky: "The people of Israel and the Land of Israel are one" (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs). In his autonomy plan of 28 December 1977 he said: "Israel insists on its rights and demand for its sovereignty over Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip." Begin also said, as quoted on Wikipedia: "Judea and Samaria are an inseparable part of Israel's sovereignty." An archived Likud history page records that under Begin the party "raised the banner of Jewish settlement in Judea & Samaria and in Galilee." The journalist Charles Enderlin wrote that Begin "favoured annexing the Palestinian territories" and was "a loyal supporter of Gush Emunim," the religious settler movement (Le Monde diplomatique, May 2021).

Washington understood the platform exactly. In 1978 Secretary of State Cyrus Vance said Likud "calls for permanent Israeli retention of all of the West Bank and Gaza" (TRT World). Responsible Statecraft: Begin "ran on a platform that was unequivocally committed to annexation of the West Bank" (Responsible Statecraft, 18 May 2020).

The same geography as the slogan​

The American historian Robin D. G. Kelley writes that the phrase "from the river to the sea" "began as a Zionist slogan signifying the boundaries of Eretz Israel"; the Hebrew of the 1977 line is ben ha-yam le-Yardén tihyé rak ribonút israelít (Wikipedia, From the river to the sea). Ahmad Khalidi of Oxford told The New York Times that the 1977 line could be seen "as having a malign intent" (New York Times, 9 November 2023). The Israel Democracy Institute, as quoted by Vox, says Likud has "traditionally supported the idea of the whole Land of Israel, even if it has not always defined the state's borders precisely" (Vox, 24 November 2023).

After October 2023 the 1977 sentence went viral. Aaron Maté posted it to more than 446,000 viewers (Aaron Maté on X, 29 October 2023); Lowkey to more than 486,000 (Lowkey on X, 18 November 2023); Eli Clifton linked the Jewish Virtual Library text (Eli Clifton on X, 8 November 2023). On Piers Morgan's program the Holocaust survivor Gabor Maté asked: "We keep talking about the Hamas charter. Did you know the Likud charter, the ruling party in Israel, excludes a Palestinian entity West of the Jordan River?" (clip posted 28 November 2023).

Go deeper: The Slogan Banned for Others, Written into Likud's Platform

Never dropped​

The 1977 platform was followed by others that kept the Jordan as the eastern border and rejected a Palestinian state west of it (see Likud Platforms 1996 to 2014). The New York Times wrote in 2023 that "Likud has since dropped the phrase, though the party has opposed a two-state solution." The substance stayed: in 2022 the coalition Netanyahu formed declared an "exclusive and inalienable right to all parts of the Land of Israel" (see The 2022 Guidelines and the Nation-State Law), and a 2025 review of the party's documents found "No changes dropping this goal have been made since the 1977 charter" (Grok on X, 5 October 2025).

Evidence rating: Likud's founding platform claims exclusive Israeli sovereignty from the sea to the Jordan: CONFIRMED (text on the Jewish Virtual Library).

Status: Menachem Begin is deceased (1992). Cyrus Vance is deceased (2002). Ze'ev Jabotinsky is deceased (1940). Robin D. G. Kelley, Ahmad Khalidi, Charles Enderlin, Aaron Maté, Gabor Maté, Eli Clifton, and Lowkey are alive. Nothing on this page states that any living person committed a crime.

Sources​

Last Updated: 2026-09-26

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