FALL SPECIAL
SALE
at
dollars a year on settlements.
There were 50,000 Israelis living
in the West Bank in 1985, 75 per-
cent of them in the Green Line
bedroom communities.
Administrations beginning
with Jimmy Carter's declared
that the settlements were an ob-
stacle to peace, because they pre-
cluded a territorial settlement
between Israel and the Arabs,
outlined in United Nations reso-
lutions 242 and 338.
After the Knesset voted in De-
cember 1981 to bring the Golan
Heights under Israeli law, which
is not quite tantamount to an-
nexation, the U.S. cancelled a
memorandum of strategic un-
derstanding with Israel.
At the same time as Begin was
settling the West Bank and Gaza,
Israel returned the Sinai to Egypt
as part of the March 1979 peace
treaty. In April 1982, Israelis
watched as their soldiers re-
moved squatters from Yamit, a
town Israel had built in the Sinai.
The government had paid its in-
MESSAGE
habitants to leave, and others
had come to occupy it. After
Yamit was cleared, the army
razed it, rather than return it to
Egypt.
Just months before Arabs and
Israelis sat down at the Madrid
peace conference in October 1991,
Begin's successor, Yitzhak
Shamir, was still using settle-
ments to make a political state-
ment.
An exasperated Secretary
of State James Baker told Con-
gress:
"Nothing has made my job of
trying to find Arab and Pales-
tinian partners for Israel more
difficult than being greeted by a
new (West Bank) settlement
every time I arrive" in the Mid-
dle East.
Elections in 1992 brought
Yitzhak Rabin and the Labor
Party back to power. Committed
to territorial compromise, Mr. Ra-
bin reached an accord with the
Palestine Liberation Organiza-
tion in September 1993 and a
peace treaty with Jordan in July
1994.
Settlement activity was re-
stricted, but not abandoned. "Ex-
isting settlements have been
allowed to continue, but there
have been no new settlements,"
Dr. Stein said. In 1994, 115,300
Jews lived in the territories.
Dr. Stein believes that Israel's
settlement policy was one of the
factors that pushed PLO leader
Yasser Arafat to the negotiating
table. "The PLO believed it was
five minutes to midnight," he
said. If he delayed, there would
be little to negotiate over. Israeli
control over the West Bank
would have been total.
As Israel prepared to hand
more control of the West Bank to
the PLO this week, the irony of
the settlements stands out: The
policy conceived to prevent Arab
control of the West Bank may
have been the one that led to the
return of the territory to Arab
hands.
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page 43
In Orchard Mall • Orchard Lake Rd. at Maple
WHICH FALL ARE YOU WAITING FOR?
SINCE 1966
green-and-white plastic sheeting.
They would sleep within the
booths that night. Some were
Efrat residents, some residents of
other settlements, some citizens
from the other side of the Green
Line. Earlier that day, about 500
demonstrators gathered to ille-
gally occupy the hill, in an at-
tempt to prevent the government
from turning it over to the Pales-
tinian Authority once the army
redeploys in the West Bank.
The army and police had pre-
pared to drive the demonstrators
off Dagan Hill, but in the end de-
cided it wasn't worth the effort,
at least not for now. They'd al-
ready run the protesters off twice
before in recent weeks, and here
they were back for a third time.
Ora Dan, a settler in Ariel, was
wearing a button that said, "This
Is Our Land," the name of the
new militant settler group that
initiated the blockade of the in-
tersections.
"When I was in Carmel Mar-
ket in Tel Aviv and some of the
vendors saw my button, they
broke out in curses against
(Prime Minister
citizens across the Green
While rocks are
thrown, Arafat and
Yitzhak) Rabin
Line, the protesters' aim was
Peres reach
and (Communi-
not to win the sympathy of
agreement.
cations Minister)
the undecided, he said, but to
Shulamit Aloni,"
enflame thousands among
she said. 'The people of Israel are "the 50-60 percent of the popula-
against giving up their land. I tion who are normal, national-
don't believe any part of the pub- istic Israelis connected to their
lic is in favor of it. I just don't be- land" to come join the battle.
lieve it."
Mr. Ha'etzni's analysis aside,
Elyakim Ha'etzni, a Kiryat in Israel it is widely believed that
Arba attorney and member of the the settlers' struggle will stand
YESHA (Judea, Samaria and or fall on how it is viewed by the
Gaza) Council, was one of the ear- masses across the Green Line.
liest proponents of the civil dis- Seeing Jews who are willing to
obedience campaign. In a go to jail, to face the billy clubs of
telephone interview, he said that the police, over and over again,
aiming to swing voters' attitudes for the sake of holding onto land
to the right was futile against the that has deep biblical and his-
government's plans to make torical significance for the coun-
changes on the ground in the try — this strikes a deep chord in
West Bank. "By the elections in Israelis.
(October) 1996, we might not
It's the sort of emotional
have a country left, or have one tableau that can overpower the
that is on the way to being lost," government's promises of peace,
he said.
and its denunciations of extrem-
The purpose of the protests, ism and lawlessness.. The West
Mr. Ha'etzni stressed, was not to Bank settlers are sending a
rally public opinion against the strong message across the Green
West Bank redeployment, but to Line, and it may yet get even
physically prevent it. As for the louder. ❑
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