MKs Tour Gush Etzion: We Demand That Construction Resumes MKs from the National Union and the Jewish Home tour Gush Etzion. "Our demand from the government is simple: build in Judea and Samaria."

Members of the National Union and the Jewish Home parties took a joint tour of Gush Etzion and Hevron on Wednesday.
During the tour, the Knesset members learned of how construction in Judea and Samaria can help the housing shortage in the entire country. The tour is the continuation of joint meetings held in recent months by members of both parties toward the establishment of a united party that will run in the next elections.

“This is the sixth meeting of the two parties, and today we decided to devote the day to a tour in Gush Etzion and in Hevron,” said Rabbi Prof. Daniel Hershkowitz, Chairman of the Jewish Home who also serves as Minister of Science & Technology.
“We are suffering from the fact that the Prime Minister is still giving orders to freeze all construction in Judea and Samaria and in Jerusalem itself,” said MK Yaakov “Ketzaleh” Katz, Chairman of the National Union. “The result [of the freeze] is that the price of housing keeps going up.
“We see that the Arabs are building and the Jewish people are not allowed to build under the regime of Binyamin Netanyahu,” added Katz. “The prices doubled just because of him.”
Katz said that his party has one clear demand from the government: That it start building in Judea and Samaria.
Efrat Mayor Oded Revivi welcomed the MKs, saying, “We see great importance in the visit today, where members of Knesset see that there is discrimination between Jews, who are not to build on land that is owned by Jews, and Arabs, who build left, right and center without any planning and any permission.”
Revivi expressed hope that the MKs will be able to change Netanyahu’s position regarding construction in Judea and Samaria.

Palestinian bid to take Israeli settlement row to UN

Arab nations have formally submitted a resolution to the UN Security Council that condemns Israeli settlement building in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, which the United States will almost certainly veto if it is brought to a vote.

The initiative starkly illustrates not only the failure of America's Mid-East policy, but the Palestinian dilemma over which strategy to pursue in the quest for statehood.

"The American administration is of course aware that a veto wouldn't be a good solution," says a UN diplomat. "They'd be vetoing a resolution which is saying what the US administration has been saying for the last 18 months."

The Obama administration had made a settlement freeze the focus of its attempts to resurrect direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.

But Washington abandoned the effort in December after Israel's refusal to reinstate a partial moratorium on construction in the occupied territories.

Fresh bid

The Palestinians, however, have not - they've turned to the UN Security Council, arguing that Jewish settlements have expanded to such an extent that they threaten the possibility of a viable Palestinian state.

The Security Council has condemned the Israeli settlement project before. But not since 1980 have the Americans supported such a resolution, and they've traditionally vetoed others critical of Israel, their staunch ally.

It is not clear what they plan to do now. Their objection appears to be not so much to the text, as to the principle of taking the matter to the Council.

In the past 20 years, the framework for peace talks has shifted from the UN to a US-led bilateral process and the Americans want to keep it that way.

"We continue to believe strongly that New York is not the place to resolve the long-standing conflict and outstanding issues between the Israelis and the Palestinians," the US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton said recently.

Forced to choose

Crucially, the Obama administration has to navigate strong domestic support for Israel. Opposing or even vetoing the resolution would provoke its Arab allies, but it may prefer that to provoking the new Republican-dominated House.

The Israelis have dismissed the resolution as a Palestinian attempt to bypass direct negotiations, which, they say, is hindering attempts to reach a two-state solution.

"Israel has demonstrated time and time again its commitment to peace, and we hope that the international community won't allow these moves to divert both sides from reaching the real goal - peace and stability in our region," said Karean Peretz, the spokeswoman for Israel's UN mission.

Few if any here expect that a UN resolution demanding a halt to all settlement activity would stop Israeli construction - it hasn't in the past. The more critical question in UN corridors is what exactly the West Bank Palestinian leadership is trying to achieve.

Does it see the resolution as a way to return to the US-brokered negotiations?

Main motive?

The Palestinian UN Ambassador, Riyad Mansour, says it's aimed at pressuring Israel to resume talks in "an appropriate and conducive atmosphere."

Others say the aim is to force the Americans to come up with proposals more acceptable to the Palestinians, who have long sought a US commitment to a state in the territory occupied by Israel in 1967, with its capital in East Jerusalem.

Or does the Palestinian leadership see the resolution as part of a new multilateral strategy?

This would return the Palestinian struggle to the foundation of UN resolutions, which have the force of international law, and seek a more direct role from the international community in ending the Israeli occupation and creating a Palestinian state.

With the stalemate in the American-led negotiations, Palestinian officials have indeed begun to pursue a more internationalist approach, lobbying for widespread recognition of their state. The plan is to request full membership at the UN when support reaches a critical mass.

However, just where the settlement resolution fits into this strategy, if at all, is not clear.

Big gamble

"The question we have been pressing the Palestinians and Arabs on is - what happens the day after a US veto, then what?" says one Western diplomat. "How are you planning to take this forward? Are you then going to ask for statehood, what is the next step? And that's where we haven't got any clear answers."

What the Palestinians have is a fair bit of international support. An independent monitoring group, the Security Council Report, predicts that upwards of 100 nations would co-sponsor the settlement resolution, and most of the Security Council members would support it.

Given such global backing (seven Latin American states have recognised a Palestinian state in the last month), many Palestinians think their leaders should ditch an ally that they believe has protected Israel far more than it has them.

"The United States brokered arrangements starting in 1991 which have made the occupation probably semi-permanent," says Rashid Khalidi, Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University in New York. "In the 20-odd years since the so-called peace process began, the number of settlers has increased from 200,000 to more than half a million."

The bottom line is that to bring the settlement resolution to a vote, the Palestinians would have to be ready to confront not only Israel, but the United States. It would be a real problem for the West Bank leadership to alienate its closest ally and main financier.

But polls show most Palestinians oppose a return to negotiations without some action on settlements, so it may be an even bigger problem for the leadership to do nothing.

I wish settlements were the issue, by Dennis Prager

According to every liberal editorial page in America (and virtually every editorial page abroad), according to President Obama, the United Nations and every other liberal institution, and according to Jews on the left, the major impediment to peace in the Middle East is Israel’s continuing construction of settlements in Jerusalem and the West Bank.

You have to say at least one thing on behalf of those on the left: They are consistent. In conflicts between a decent society and an indecent society, you can almost always count on the left to blame the decent society. The U.S. was wrong in overthrowing the mass murderer Saddam Hussein. The U.S. was wrong in fighting North Vietnam’s Stalinist tyrant, Ho Chi Minh. The U.S. was wrong in backing the Nicaraguan opposition to the Communist Sandinistas. Israel was wrong in its war against the murderous, Israel-denying, Jew-hating, Islamist totalitarian Hamas. And Israel is wrong today in its conflict with the Palestinians.

Actually, you can say one more thing: The left regularly confuses wishful thinking with reality. You see, I, too, wish that Israeli settlement construction — usually no more than apartment construction within existing Jewish communities within or right outside of Jerusalem — were the obstacle to peace between Israel and the Palestinians. But not being on the left, I am cursed with not assuming that what I would like to believe is reality.

If only these apartments were the problem. What a great day it would be for all of us who yearn to see the Jewish state accepted by its Palestinian and other Arab neighbors.

But, alas, this is make-believe. As Charles Krauthammer asked in a column he wrote a year ago, “Is the peace process moribund because a teacher in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem is making an addition to her house to accommodate new grandchildren?”

Not quite. As Krauthammer noted, “Blaming Israel and picking a fight over ‘natural growth’ may curry favor with the Muslim ‘street.’ But it will only induce the Arab states to do like Abbas: sit and wait for America to deliver Israel on a platter.”

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, one of Israel’s most right-wing politicians, lives in a settlement. He has said that, to achieve peace he and his family would abandon their home. And for real peace, if necessary, Israel would force religious and secular settlers to abandon their homes as well.

If the conflict isn’t due to settlement buildings, then, why is there no peace between Israel and the Palestinians?

For the same reason the Jewish state was invaded by six Arab armies when it was born.

For the same reason Gamal Abdel Nasser, the Egyptian dictator, declared his intention to destroy Israel and, in partnership with Syria and Jordan, tried to do so in May-June 1967.

For the same reason that, in September 1967, the Arab nations gathered in Khartoum, Sudan, and declared their “Three No’s”: no peace with Israel, no negotiations with Israel, no recognition of Israel.

For the same reason the Palestinians sent human bombs into Israeli schools, weddings, pizza parlors and buses to maim and murder as many Jews as possible.

For the same reason Yasser Arafat unleashed more terror on Israelis in 2001 right after he rejected the offer of a Palestinian state made by Israel’s left-wing Prime Minister Ehud Barak and by President Bill Clinton.

For the same reason Iran’s dictator Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly called for Israel’s annihilation.

For the same reason Egyptian, Palestinian, Syrian and other Arab and Muslim countries’ media regularly broadcast the most anti-Semitic propaganda since the Nazis.

And that reason is that most Palestinians and most other Muslims in the Middle East, and many Muslims elsewhere, do not believe that a Jewish state should be allowed to exist, period, in an area once dominated by Islam. That — not Israeli apartment-building — is the problem.

Postscript: I just released the latest video course in my Internet project known as Prager University: prageru.com. It is, like the other courses, five minutes long. With the aid of maps and other illustrations, it explains what I have written here: The Middle East issue revolves around Arab/Muslim rejection of a Jewish state. According to YouTube, it has been viewed by 300,000 visitors in its first two weeks. I note this, first, to inform readers of this column about the video; second, to note how hungry people are for a clear explanation of the real reason for the lack of peace between Israel and the Palestinians; and third, because I have been moved by how many Israelis have written to me to thank me for the video. With nearly all the world — including many Jews — blaming Israel, they had forgotten why they don’t deserve to be.

Israeli Amb. Michael Oren: "There Are No Settlements in Jerusalem"

The 'settlement issue' is bogus

Here's an interview with David Hazony (which was supposed to discuss his new book on the Ten Commandments) in which Hazony suddenly finds himself in a discussion about Israeli 'settlements.' David does quite well. Even the Muslim representative agrees.

Ariel, West Bank - Despite Ban, Palestinians Build The Settlements

Ariel, West Bank - It's a startling fact: The workers building Israel's West Bank settlements have generally been Palestinians — even though Palestinians widely consider these communities a toxic threat to their dream of an independent state.
Now comes a twist: earlier this year, the Palestinian government passed a law forbidding work in the settlements — and its determination to stamp out the phenomenon is being sorely tested in recent weeks, as a settlement building boomlet has emerged in the West Bank.
With the Palestinian economy facing double-digit unemployment, the issue has sparked some soul-searching and debate.
"It is immoral for us — totally immoral for us — to work in settlements," said Economics Minister Hassan Abu Libdeh, an enthusiastic supporter of the law which passed in April and bans Palestinians from such work.
Abu Libdeh said the ban — which imposes fines of up to $14,000 and jail time of up to five years for violators — will eventually be enforced. But for now, he said, the government is holding off while it searches for ways to help workers switch jobs.
About 21,000 Palestinians currently work in settlements, either in construction, agriculture or industry. Their ability to return to the settlements in recent years — after a period of violence from 2000-2005 which saw the two peoples separated almost completely — has been key to the mini-revival of the Palestinian economy.
But it is also helping the settlements prosper and expand.
Some 300,000 Israelis live in more than 120 settlements across the West Bank — almost a threefold increase over two decades of peace negotiations. Another 180,000 live in east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians hope to make their capital.
In the settlement of Ariel on Wednesday, Palestinian laborers readily admitted they were torn between politics and paychecks.
Dozens of them mixed cement, laid bricks and arranged red tiles on the roofs of 48 new apartments at a dusty construction site in what is already a town boasting 19,000 residents.
Most work eight-hour shifts five days a week and earn between $35 and $55 per day — which is somewhat less than what Israeli workers would cost, but more than what is generally available to Palestinians in the West Bank. There, similar jobs usually pay $25 per day in the Palestinian cities and $15 in rural areas.
Sitting inside a yellow tractor, Abed Abdel-Karim, 41, said he'd been working in settlements for 15 years. He said they threaten the future Palestinian state but said he has no other way to earn a living.
He acknowledged it was a problem, "but it's not my job to fix it ... I'm married and have kids. I don't want to be a millionaire. I just want to pay my bills."
Palestinians have opposed the settlements since Israel captured east Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip from Jordan in the 1967 Mideast war. Supported by most of the world community, they consider the West Bank occupied territory and say moving Israeli civilians there violates international law. Israel calls it disputed territory and says it can build there until a peace deal is reached.
The settlements emerged as a hugely contentious issue in the U.S.-led peace talks launched in September. It was Israel's decision to end a 10-month moratorium on new construction that caused the talks to grind to a halt just weeks later.
Now there are hundreds of new units in various stages of construction — and Palestinians, just as before, are at the heart of the enterprise, despite the ban.
Palestinian Labor Minister Ahmed Majdalani said that one way the government is trying to combat the phenomenon is the creation of an investment fund aimed at supporting large-scale construction projects and other Palestinian employers.
The fund, announced in May, is hoping to tap international donors, but so far the only moneys have come from the Palestinian Authority itself — $5 million, or a tenth of the $50 million target.
Even if the fund takes off, Palestinian companies will likely continue to pay less than Israeli ones. But Majdalani said he's counting on national pride and fear of punishment to entice workers away from settlements.
"We don't consider the difference in pay a justification for anyone to go work in the settlements — not nationalistically, politically or morally," he said.
Another possible solution for the Palestinian workers is the planned city of Rawabi, which will be built from the ground up for 40,000 residents; but this massive project remains on hold because Israel has not given builders permission for a key access road.
At the construction site in Ariel, 32-year-old Abdel-Jaber Bouzia was doubtful any of these schemes would work. He did not fear the legal ban on working in the settlements and could hardly imagine their removal.
"Maybe after a million years," he said, shoveling sand into a rumbling cement mixer. "Or on Judgment Day."
What do the settlers say?
Settler spokeswoman Aliza Herbst noted that some settlements themselves ban Arab labor, sometimes due to security concerns, but it remains attractively cheap and abundant.
She said she supports the Palestinian government's efforts because she would prefer employers were freed of the financial temptation and hired Jews instead.
"I hope they succeed," she said.

NYT: Netanyahu Sharply Insists on Building in Jerusalem: “Jerusalem is not a settlement..."

JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office sharply rejected international criticism of Israel’s most recently announced building plans in East Jerusalem, saying in a statement: “Jerusalem is not a settlement: Jerusalem is the capital of the State of Israel.”

The statement said that Israel had “never agreed to limit its construction in any way in Jerusalem where 800,000 inhabitants live.”
The comments came on the heels of President Obama’s criticism of the construction plans. Speaking during his visit to Indonesia, Mr. Obama said that the Israeli announcement — plans for 1,000 new units for a contested part of East Jerusalem — added to the difficulties of Israeli-Palestinian talks. “This kind of activity is never helpful when it comes to peace negotiations,” he said, “and I’m concerned that we’re not seeing each side make the extra effort involved to get a breakthrough.”

The statement from Mr. Netanyahu’s office addressed the talks by saying that “Israel sees no connection at all between the peace process and building plans in Jerusalem.”

It also noted that Israeli governments had built housing in Jerusalem for the past 40 years and that Egypt and Jordan had signed peace treaties with Israel during that time.

“The differences of opinion between the United States and Israel on the subject of Jerusalem are well known,” it said. “We hope to overcome them and to continue to make progress in diplomatic negotiations.”

The Israeli announcement came in the form of plans published for public review in the back pages of local newspapers on Friday, just before Mr. Netanyahu headed to Washington. But as in previous announcements of new construction plans on disputed land, Israeli officials said that the timing was bureaucratically determined, not politically.

They said the latest announcement was a result of a decision by housing bodies three weeks ago. Still, the timing coincidence raised questions of what Mr. Netanyahu knew and when.

After Vice President Joseph R. Biden’s visit to Israel was marred last March by an announcement of Jerusalem building plans that Mr. Netanyahu said came as a surprise to him, American officials said they made clear to the Israelis that they expected no further such surprises in the coming months.

At the time, Mr. Netanyahu’s aides said he sent out letters to all offices concerned with settlement building demanding detailed lists of upcoming plans to avoid such an unexpected announcement while peace talks with the Palestinians were under way or in preparation.

It was unclear whether Mr. Netanyahu knew about the latest announcement before it was published in newspapers late last week.

Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, said in a statement on Tuesday that Israel’s actions threatened the negotiating process and was “a call for immediate international recognition of the Palestinian State.”

The statement added: “Once more, at the moment that we expected Prime Minister Netanyahu to announce a full settlement freeze from Washington D.C., he has sent Palestinians and the U.S. administration a clear message that Israel chooses settlements, not peace. Netanyahu sent the same message during U.S. Vice-President Biden’s visit last March by announcing a plan to build 1,600 units in Ramat Shlomo settlement.

“Israel’s settlement enterprise which is comprised not only of the actual settlements but also the wall, settler-only roads, and movement restrictions on Palestinians, is nothing but a premeditated process to kill the possibility of an independent Palestinian state.”

The Palestinian leadership has been talking for some weeks about shifting it focus to getting international recognition of a Palestinian state if settlement building continued and peace talks remained stalled. The Obama administration has urged it not to go that route.

On Tuesday it also became clear that some 800 housing units would be built in the West Bank settlement of Ariel.

Those units had been planned since the early 1990s but were held up due to a dispute over land ownership which concluded several weeks ago. The units are privately funded on private land and do not require special government permission to go forward although if a settlement freeze were under way they too would be halted.

CAMERA: CBS "60 Minutes" Joins the Arab Propaganda Bandwagon on Jerusalem

One of the main obstacles in previous peace-making efforts has been Arab unwillingness to accept Israel as a Jewish state and Muslim denial of Judaism's historical and religious ties to Jerusalem. U.S. negotiator Dennis Ross complained that during the July 2000 negotiations at Camp David, Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat's only contribution was his refusal to acknowledge Jewish ties to Jerusalem, claiming the Jewish Temple never existed there. When talks resumed in Taba later that year, the Israelis agreed to full Palestinian sovereignty on the Temple Mount, but requested Palestinians acknowledge the sacredness of the place to Judaism. They refused. (See "The Battle Over Jerusalem and the Temple Mount") Moreover, Palestinian leaders not only deny the existence of Jewish holy sites in Jerusalem, they falsely allege that Jews are trying to takeover or destroy Muslim holy sites there. In that way, they follow the lead of Jerusalem Mufti and Nazi sympathizer Haj al Amin Husseini who so successfully incited anti-Jewish rioting in the1920's by making his battle cry "Defend Muslim Holy Sites."

The efforts to delegitimize Israel's claim to Jerusalem have generally been limited to Arab and Muslim leaders, but recently, international media outlets have jumped on board to support them. The latest one to join the fray is Lesley Stahl of CBS News's "60 Minutes" in an October 17^th segment entitled "Controversy in Jerusalem: The City Of David."

CBS 60 Minutes segment on City of David

Here's Sunday Night's 60 Minutes segment on the City of David (Shiloach or Silwan).

Leslie Stahl can't understand that the 'peace talks' have been going on for 17 years and have gone nowhere. Life cannot be stopped forever for the 'peace talks.' By the way, I think the archeologist was brilliant. And the young couple didn't do too badly either.

Pisgat Zeev - Israel Approves New East Jerusalem Homes

Pisgat Zeev - Israel's government ended an unofficial freeze on new building in east Jerusalem, approving the construction of 238 homes in Jewish neighborhoods as peace talks remained stuck Friday over the fate of a broader construction slowdown throughout the West Bank.

As always, the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity....Palestinians reject offer of recognition in exchange for freeze

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would reinstate a West Bank construction freeze if the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state.
Netanyahu made the offer Monday in a wide-ranging speech at the opening of the Knesset’s winter session.
“If the Palestinian leadership will say unequivocally to its people that it recognizes Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people, I will be ready to convene my government and request a further suspension,” Netanyahu said. “Just as the Palestinians expect us to recognize their state, we expect reciprocal treatment.”
The Palestinian Authority issued a statement rejecting Netanyahu’s offer immediately following the speech.
Netanyahu called the deal a “trust-building step.” He said that such recognition was not a precondition to talks for Israel.
The prime minister said that he has floated the idea to the Palestinians, who have not been responsive to the idea.
“The United States is attempting other means to ensure that the talks take place,”  he said.
Netanyahu pointed out that Israel enforced a 10-month building freeze in the West Bank “with determination and without compromise,” adding that “Unfortunately, the Palestinians wasted those 10 months as well. Now they demand that we continue the moratorium as a condition to continuing the talks. I hope they are not doing so to avoid making the real decisions necessary for a peace agreement.”
In saying that a peace agreement must include a strong security arrangement, Netanyahu pointed out that Israel previously had peaceful relations with both Iran and Turkey, with whom Israel’s relations have “deteriorated against our will.”
The statement by the Palestinians said they would return to peace talks in exchange for a freeze on building in the settlements.
“The issue of the Jewishness of the state has nothing to do with the matter,”  said Nabil Abu Rdainah, a spokesman for PA President Mahmoud Abbas. 

The Conflict Is Not About Settlements The Jews on the West Bank do not hold the key to peace; any attempt to remove them will have decidedly non-peaceful consequences

The Palestinian Arab leadership is making a real song and dance about Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria. But why? After all, these settlements are hardly at the root of the conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbours and their Islamist sponsors.

There were no such settlements between 1948 and 1967 but there was still conflict. The war launched against Israel in 1948 at the behest of the Arab League was not about settlements. It was about the Jewish right of national self-determination and the hostility of the Muslim world to the exercise of this right in an area regarded as part of the Realm of Islam.

That was what the conflict was about in 1948, 1956, 1967 and 1973. That is what the conflict is still about today.

But the reality today is not the reality of 1948, 1956, 1967 or 1973. That much, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas understands. While he is reportedly unwilling to recognise Israel as a Jewish state, he is not insisting on the fact of Israel's existence becoming an item on the peace agenda he has been discussing with Bibi Netanyahu.

The war launched against Israel in 1948 was not about settlements

Instead, Abbas is obsessing about Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria in general and, in particular, about the freeze on building within and extending these settlements.

As a matter of fact, I can tell you that some construction work continued without fuss during the recent 10-month moratorium. It is an open secret that the Abbas government has signalled its agreement in principle to a land-swap, whereby many Jewishly settled areas in Samaria and Judea would remain within Israeli jurisdiction as part of a final peace treaty.

In this sense, the Palestinian President's opposition to settlement construction is nothing more than a device - a manufactured distraction that he hopes will boost his image in the Muslim world, make him appear a tough negotiator and give him the excuse, should he deem one necessary, to leave the peace talks altogether, putting the blame squarely on Israel for their collapse.

Attending a recent "off-the-record" briefing, I was more than mildly surprised at the gullibility of some of my colleagues, who simply did not comprehend the problems that any Israeli government would face were it, in a moment of weakness or stupidity, to agree to dismember the West Bank settlements.

Withdrawing from Gaza was relatively simple: around 8,000 Jews were browbeaten into moving back into Israel, where their treatment is a national disgrace - many are still living in makeshift accommodation. In Judea and Samaria, there are around 300,000 Jews. Moving them would be an altogether different proposition.

Last May, the Oxford Research Group, an independent think tank, published a report (Pariahs to Pioneers) that attempted to address these difficulties. It pointed out that the Jewish communities of Samaria and Judea must not be thought of as a homogenous group. It identified 20 per cent of the settlers as "secular", attracted to the West Bank by the quality of life that it offers; some of these (it claimed) were already on the move westwards. Another 29 per cent were anti-Zionist "ultra-Orthodox," attracted (the report argued) by cheap, subsidised housing. A further 40 per cent were "ideological" settlers, many of whom (the report admitted) might not be seduced by any carrot, no matter how large, or subdued by any stick, no matter how heavy. These unfortunates might simply be abandoned within a new, secular Palestinian state.

I want to say, for the record, that I respect the ORG for its courage in searching for peaceful solutions to seemingly intractable problems. Equally, however, I am appalled by its naivety.

Yes, some West Bankers will be prompted to move by a generous compensation package. It is my belief that most will not. Some West Bankers will succumb to the blackmail inherent in the threat of abandonment. It is my belief that many will stand and fight. Any Israeli government that attempts to remove them by force risks igniting an insurrection bordering on, and quite possibly resulting in, civil war.

But, in any case, to see the settlers as a series of human targets that can be "picked off" is to betray a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of the Jewish presence on the West Bank.

The fact is that, economically and industrially, the West Bank settlements have become an integral and vital component of the Jewish state. Netanyahu understands this. So (I suspect) does Abbas. But not, alas, the worthies of the Oxford Research Group.

The Building Freeze is Bad for Israel