Cabinet: All West Bank outposts on private Palestinian land to go by year's end.
In their latest e-mail update, Peace Now regarded this as a success. Bibi agreed to dismantle illegal settlement outposts if they were built on private Palestinian land. So they're chipping away. It's a step in the right direction. My question is, how seriously is this gesture going to be taken, and how successfully will it legitimize all the other settlements that were built on Israel's "state land" in the West Bank?
And what will it take for Israel to give back the "state land" that was acquired through shady, outdated laws?
By Hook or By Crook: How to Build an Illegal Settlement (B'Tselem)
"We'll make a pastrami sandwich of them. Yes, we'll insert a strip of Jewish settlements in between the Palestinians, and then another strip of Jewish settlements right across the West Bank, so that in 25 years' time, neither the United Nations nor the United States, nobody, will be able to tear it apart."
Ariel Sharon, 1973
"We'll Make a Pastrami Sandwich of Them": review of the documentary Iron Wall (The Green Left)
No suprise the settlement of Ariel (creepily named the Ariel Finger) is named after Mr. Sharon.
So how do these settlements get funded? Through the Israeli government and generous American donors...
L.A. Donors Play Role in Israeli Settlements (Jewish Journal)
Ariel
The only uplifting thing about that Haaretz article were the comments. Usually there's some right vs. left exchange, but thus far everyone seems like everyone can see through Bibi's attempt to normalize the settlement enterprise.
