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OPINION
Arab Building Rush
Pushes Capital Bounds
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ARNOLD BLUMBERG
Special to The Jewish News
esident Clinton and Secretary
f State Madeleine Albright
have adopted a favorite expres-
sion in their advice to Israel.
They urge Prime Minister Binyamin
Netanyahu to "take a break" or to "take
time out" and to cease building Jewish
residences in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
The rationale for that advice is to
freeze the situation until a final bound-
ary line can be drawn. There might be
some rationale for such advice if Yasser
Arafat and his Arab constituents could
be persuaded to do the same. Such,
however, is not the case. The Arabs are
building in the disputed territories as
though they know that actual residence
will determine future borders.
Having returned from a 10-week stay
in the territories, I have had adequate
opportunity to see what Arab and Jew
are doing to affect the future boundaries
being set by the so-called peace process.
Driving through Judea and Samaria
on an almost daily basis, I witnessed a
gargantuan Arab building race. Private
homes, obviously very expensive, hug
the roadside. The Arab building spasm
presses the visible facts of ownership to
the limit.
Israeli building and spending is much
less visible. To be sure, a bypass road has
been constructed linking the Jews of
Arnold Blumberg is professor emeritus
of history at Towson University in Balti-
more.
PRESENTS
LETTERS
Is this then another example of
"reporting" by Besser or, to my mind,
his usual slanting of the news to fit his
own political agenda through "colum-
nizing"?
Jerome S. Kaufman
Bloomfield Hills
Friday, July 31st
10:00 - 5:00
INSIDE ORCHARD MALL
West Bloomfield
Orchard Lake Rd., North of Maple
7/17
1998
32
248-626-0886
Kiryat Arba and Hebron to Jerusalem, L
running through areas where Arab pop-
ulation density is thin. As that bypass
road approaches Jerusalem, two impres-
sive new tunnels run beneath Arab
towns through the earth itself, making it
plain that Israel has no intention of sur-
rendering the Etzion Bloc in the final
settlement.
However, when Israelis propose to
build Jewish housing on Har Homa, on —\
land owned by Jews within the city of
Jerusalem, a cry goes up from Ms.
Albright and Mr. Clinton, that some-
how the "peace process" is threatened.
Their cheering squad pretends that Har
Homa is in the middle of densely
inhabited Arab towns. In actuality, if
Israel intends to retain Jerusalem, undi-
vided, it is essential that areas such as
Har Homa become centers for Jewish
residence. To be sure, it abuts upon an
Arab village and is not far from Arab
Bethlehem. However, it is also a short
distance from Talpiot, a major Jewish
commercial and residential neighbor-
hood.
The battle is already joined. If Mr.
Netanyahu is frightened into non-action
by the bullying of Mr. Clinton and Ms.
Albright, the unthinkable will happen.
Jerusalem will be divided.
At the heart of this life-and-death
battle for the survival of Israel is one
essential question. When all is said and
done, is Yasser Arafat a dependable part-
ner who will keep his word if a final set-
dement is ever completed? The answer
screams out a loud "No!" Nevertheless,
a majority of American Jews move
Propaganda
Hard To Take
I had to laugh at "Palestinians Need a
Change Of Heart" (July 10), former
U.S. Senator Rudy Boschwitz's opinion
piece.
He so seriously tells us that Israel's
peace partners, the Palestinians, as he
thinks of them, are still acting like
they're still completely committed to
annihilating Israel. How shocking! But,
you know, any group that deliberately
takes its name — the Filistin in both
Arabic and Hebrew — from the Bible's
ancient Philistines has got to be pretty
bad.
Let's not swallow all the propaganda
of our enemies. Politic a lly incorrect as it
may be to poke fun at anybody's most
cherished myths and values, this busi-
ness of Palestinianism is a weird busi-
ness. We need to deconstruct it.
PLO Minister Hanan Ashrawi says
that they're the Canaanites. False. Yassir
Arafat says that our Abraham and the
gentiles' Jesus — Yeshuaben Yosef, the
Jew — were Filistin. False. Hundreds of
millions of souls will swear that the
whole land of Israel, almost from time
immemorial, belonged to the Palestini-
ans. False. Everybody knows that the
Palestinians, thanks to the Jews, got a
raw deal. False. That modern Jewish set-
PROPAGANDA on page 34