semitism.net

Want to understand why most Palestinians are so cynical about the prospects for a viable state at peace with Israel? To paraphrase James Carville and company: “it’s the settlements, stupid.”

Drive around the West Bank, and you see them on every hilltop. The white houses with red roofs are unmistakable - as are the adjacent clusters of trailers marking new outposts. Cranes and bulldozers are visible in many.

Look at the maps prepared by Peace Now and its obvious that the settlements do not just cluster around the Green Line. They’re spread quite extensively through the entire territory, as far east as the Jordan River.

No Palestinian, surrounded by this reality, thinks the “settlement freeze” promised by all prime ministers since 1993 is anything but a joke.

Now a new report commissioned by the office of the Prime Minister confirms that settlement expansion, prohibited under the Oslo Accord, has been proceding vigorously, with direct support from the top echelons of Israel’s government, since the day the accord was signed. The report was prepared by attorney Talia Sasson. I quote from her executive summary:

The expansion of the unauthorized outposts… began in the mid nineties, after the building in Judea, Samaria and Gaza was frozen by the Rabin Administration in 1993…

In fact, the unauthorized outposts phenomenon is a continuation of the settlement enterprise in the territories. But while in the distant past the Israeli governments officially acknowledged and encouraged the settlement enterprise, in some of the years, a major change took place in the beginning of the nineties. The Israeli governments were no longer officially involved in the establishment of settlements, apparently due to Israel’s international situation, and the negative position of most nations towards the settlement enterprise. That was not the case for public authorities and other Israeli government bodies, who took, along with others, a major role in establishing the unauthorized outposts.

The Palestinians, of course, understand this better than anyone. The daily experience of seeing their land appropriated and their state, in effect, foreclosed, has fueled tremendous cynicism regarding the peace process. This goes a long way toward explaining the failure of Oslo.

The report supports the claims of Palestinian landowners, that their fields were seized outright for settlement projects. According to Haaretz:

Many of the outposts built in the territories since March 2001 were established on lands that are not state-owned: 15 are on private Palestinian land, and 46 on lands of unknown ownership, Attorney Talia Sasson, author of the report on illegal outposts, said yesterday.

“The Housing Ministry was virtually indifferent to the question of who owns the land,” Sasson said at a news conference in Jerusalem…

The report focuses on “illegal” settlements or “outposts”, defined as settlements built without an official government resolution, on land not owned by Israel, without a building permit, and without bounds of jurisdiction issued by the IDF. This definition raises obvious questions - what settlement is legal under Oslo? In what sense is any land east of the Green Line “owned” by the State of Israel?

In its analysis, Haaretz notes: “The difference between the terms, ’settlement’ and ‘outpost,’ will turn out to be a myth, relating more to the internal dialogue of self-deception that has been going on in Israel for years.”

Nonetheless, Ms. Sasson’s report goes a long way toward exposing what has been happening in the West Bank under everyone’s nose for the past decade. It is packed with interesting information. For example, it reveals the ways the settlers circumvent the procedures that supposedly regulate settlement construction.

One way to establish an outpost is first to falsely ask for an antenna to be placed up on a hill. Afterwards comes a request to supply electricity - only for the antenna. Then a cabin is placed, for the guard, and the cabin is also connected to the electricity. Then a road is paved to the place, and infrastructure for caravans is prepared. Then, one day a number of caravans arrive at the place - and an outpost is established.

Another way is falsely requesting to build an agricultural farm (either an acclimatization or a biosphere farm). The farm is supposedly built for agricultural needs. After a while, caravans arrive to the place and an outpost is established.

Another way is founding an educational institution. “Staff” families settle in the place and an outpost is established.

Another way is establishing outposts by “expansions” and “neighborhoods” in disguise, within an existing outpost. The new outpost is named as the old one, as though it were just a neighborhood, even when it is sometimes kilometers away (as the crow flies; on the ground the distance is much greater)… This enables financing the new outpost by the different authorities: the money supposedly goes to the old settlement, as known to the authorities. In fact, it goes to the new outpost.

After a while, when the outpost stands still, it is no longer convenient for its inhabitants to be considered just as a neighborhood of an existing settlement. They wish for direct connection to different sources; they are interested in an independent emblem given by the Ministry of Interior Affairs (which allows budget from the Ministry of Interior Affairs as a local authority). Therefore the Assistant to Defense Minister - Settlement Affairs requests the Settlement Division of the World Zionist Organization to acknowledge some of the outposts as independent settlements, eligible for an emblem and a budget.

The report makes it clear that these activities occured with the complicity of the Israeli agencies in charge of monitoring settlement growth and development.

The “engine” behind a decision to establish outposts are probably regional councils in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, settlers and activists, imbued with ideology and motivation to increase Israeli settlement in the Judea, Samaria and Gaza territories. Some of the officials working in the Settlement Division of the World Zionist Organization, and in the Ministry of Construction & Housing, cooperated with them to promote the unauthorized outposts phenomenon. After the mid nineties, these actions were apparently inspired by different Ministers of Housing, either by overlooking or by actual encouragement and support, with additional support from other Ministries, initiated either by officials or by the political echelon of each Ministry.

The Sasson report in essence states that Israel pursued a secret policy of continuing to settle the occupied territories during the Oslo period. It seems highly unlikely that this was done without the tacit support of the Prime Minister. So the million-dollar question is why Ariel Sharon commissioned a report that blows the whistle a policy that he himself has supported. The answer appears to be that he did it under pressure from the U.S.

Sharon requisitioned the report on the outposts not to learn something he hadn’t known before, but to minimize the damage and in an effort to divert discussion away from the fate of the settlements in general and onto the outposts only. But, apparently, this too won’t do any good. The insistent demand from Washington to afford the Palestinian state to be established with “territorial contiguity” that will not be hampered by settlements, coupled with the fact that George Bush and Condoleezza Rice make sure of mentioning this expression at every opportunity, will lead in the end to the evacuation of all the settlements that get in the way of acceptable contiguity.

May it be so. At the moment, the U.S. is signaling that it expects action on the “illegal” outposts. Haaretz reported last week that “The U.S. administration has warned Israel that its failure to keep its promise to remove all outposts established in the West Bank since March 2001 will harm relations between the countries and could have an impact on American aid to Israel.” A few days later, the cabinet announced that it would dismantle 24 outposts. This is fewer than 25% of those identified by Sasson; and the cabinet recommended putting off action on them until after the Gaza disengagement is complete.

There was supposed to be a companion report to Sasson’s. Its aim was to demarcate the built-up areas in all of the settlements, including those that preceded Oslo, for the purpose of placing limits on their growth. The second report - promised in a letter from Dov Wesglass to Condoleeza Rice last April - was assigned to Brigadier General Baruch Spiegel, who was to work in cooperation with a group of American experts. Haaretz reports today that Israel has, in effect, stonewalled the Spiegel report:

The joint task force was supposed to work on the basis of aerial photographs of the settlements. However, Israel had no updated photographs, a fact that attorney Talia Sasson also noted in the report on the outposts that she submitted to Sharon last week. And in the 11 months since Weisglass sent his letter, the government has made no effort to rectify this: It has neither commissioned such photographs from a private company nor utilized Israel’s own satellite to take such pictures (the latter proposal was nixed by the Defense Ministry). As a result, the American experts have repeatedly postponed their planned trip to Israel.

In the meantime, Sharon has approved the final route of the separation wall. According to the International Herald Tribune,

The final route of Israel’s separation barrier around Jerusalem is intended to enclose large areas claimed by the Palestinians, including their intended capital and the biggest Jewish settlement in the West Bank, Israeli officials have confirmed. The route would also place a holy site in the Palestinian town of Bethlehem on the Israeli side of the barrier, while leaving a Palestinian refugee camp in Jerusalem encircled by a separate fence, the officials said.

It seems to me Sharon is biding his time, giving the Americans the least he can get away with, and waiting for a new outbreak of violence or some other event that will allow him to back off his committments with regard to the West Bank settlements. His aim is to draw Israel’s eastern border to his own specifications, rather than establish one in negotiation with the Palestinians.

The current peace is tenuous. Mahmoud Abbas has taken swift and effective action to stop attacks on Israelis. He has signaled in many ways a willingness to negotiate the most intractable issues in the conflict, such as the Palestinian right of return. But substantive moves on Israel’s side are still lacking. The release of political prisoners (most of whom were near the end of their sentences) and the handover of a few towns are little more than gestures. The Gaza disengagement plan will not be interpreted as a move toward a peaceful settlement if it is accompanied by expansion into more land on the West Bank.

American pressure can make a difference. American Jews - whether motivated by the desire for justice, or simply by the wish to see Israel at peace with its neighbors - should signal our clear support for dismantling settlements east of the Green Line, and for action by our govenment to hold Israel responsible for its committments in this matter.