Obama said that Israel must freeze illegal settlements if there is to be peace. But what about the settlements already built? Surely, they will have to be removed before Hamas and other factions have an incentive to cease their violence against their old enemy.
Right of return is the other contentious topic on which there has been no headway over the decades. If they all die out; will peace follow?
OK, so you’re a bit confused about the terminology.
When Israelis speak of “illegal settlements”, they’re referring to settlements illegal under *Israeli *law - settlements built without Israeli government approval. These are basically squatters and ideologues, and they only make up a tiny fraction of settlers.
You, it seems, are referring to all of the Israeli settlements on the other side of the Green Line as “illegal.” To answer your question: most of them will not be removed unless as part of a comprehensive peace agreement, not as an incentive; many will most likely never be removed at all. You’re talking about over 250,000 people here, many of whom have been living there for three generations. You don’t just “remove” that amount of people.
What Obama was referring to was a freeze on the expansion of existing settlements - meaning no new construction in existing towns.
As for for the “right of return”, you seem to believe that it refers only to those Palestinians who left the land in 1948. The universally accepted position in the Arab world is that it refers to them and their descendants, several million in number. They’re not likely to die out.
As discussed in the two other threads on the front page at the moment, Israel has, at points, agreed to dismantle some of the settlements in the territories in exchange for peace. It should also be noted, as it was in at least one of those two threads, that the vast majority of land that the settlements are built on was, in fact, never privately owned and that by far, most of the land in the territories would have been state/waste land, and without a sovereign power its disposition is less than certain. On preview, as Alessan points out, there is also a difference between settlements that are illegal under Israeli law and the claim that any and all Israeli presence in the West Bank is a violation of Palestinian land claims to that area.
Further, your formulations are a bit odd, as some ‘settlements’ consists of Jews who returned to Jewish areas of residence which were ethnically cleansed circa 1948. Like everything else having to do with the region, simplistic formulations are a hindrance, not a benefit. Not to mention that Israel will not, at any point, return 100% to the Green Line, it just won’t happen. UNSC 242 (while non-binding) was based off of that logic and, for historical reasons, Jerusalem itself is unlikely to be up for negotiation.
Further, the PLO was founded before the 1967 war with the goal of destroying Israel itself as a nation. Hamas, likewise, has made clear that they do not differentiate and believe that all of the region is to be considered a Waqf due to Muslim conquest. Both Hamas and more ‘mainstream’ factions of the PA have and continue to advocate anti-semitism, genocide and a rejection of the right of Israel to exist at all (and/or a denial that Israel does exist, at all, as anything other than an illegal occupying force of “Palestine”, by which they refer to 100% of non-Jordanian Mandate territory). And such advocacy/education not confined to the argument over who owns what in the West Bank. Additionally, as agreements like the framework laid out at the 2000 Camp David Summit would have dealt with a huge percentage of West Bank land, Hamas et al already had ‘incentives’ and they proved to be non-incentives from the mindset of those groups.
So, will Israel turn over a non-zero percentage of West Bank towns/villages when any Final Status negotiation goes through? Yes. Will it, most likely, resemble Clinton’s Bridging Proposal? Maybe. Are groups like Hamas, the militant factions of the PLO, etc… going to be willing to deal if Israel were to retreat to the Green Line tomorrow? No.
As for the ‘right of return’, the idea has already been proposed that the actual refugees (and/or their descendants ,and their descendants descendants descendants, etc… as defined by the UNRWA as refugees) will receive compensation at a negotiated rate. Ironically enough (or, perhaps, predictably enough) claims for Arab compensation are never twinned with claims for the roughly equivalent number of Jews who were forced out of their homes circa 1948 to be compensated, as well. Most likely the Jews who were forced out by the Arab governments will never receive compensation while the Arabs who were driven from the area by war and/or Israel/Arab policies will receive some form of compensation. Such are ME politics.
To sort of go along with what Alessan is saying, here is a CNN article:
I think the OP is conflating two things…‘illegal settlements’ (illegal by Israeli law) and freezing settlements, which is what Obama is asking Israel to do.
Why do you think that this would appease Hamas…or that Israel should have to appease them in this manner? Why do you think this would halt the violence from Hamas and the other militant Palestinian (and other) factions against Israel? What do you base this on? This is a serious question that I’m asking to see where you are coming from here. What do you know about these settlements?
If who all dies out? All of the Palestinian’s?
-XT
OTOH, how is leaving them in place an option? Palestine can’t be independent if it has to tolerate Israeli enclaves inside its borders, and bringing them under Palestinian jurisdiction is no more thinkable.
Most of the big ones (the “settlement blocks”) are basically contiguous with the Green Line; a permanent border will most likely be defined with them on the Israeli side.
Isn’t that a dangerous incentive for Israeli governments to expand settlements during years when peace agreements are unlikely, possibly further exacerbating tensions?
Which are the “big ones”? This map, for example, looks as though there are settlements scattered throughout much of the West Bank almost all the way over to the Jordan. Which of those would be included in an expanded Israeli border?
Maybe, but it’s a moot point - the Israeli government doesn’t expand settlements, the settlements expand themselves. They’re living, growing communities, and as such, need constant new houses, schools etc. Now maybe the government can stop issuing permits for new construction (thus drawing the wrath of the politically powerful building industry, among others), but even then, the effects won’t be felt until several years down the line, as many projects are already underway.
Isn’t it a prime incentive for the PA to make peace ASAP, to avoid further expansion?
This sounds contradictory to me. Are you saying that all new construction in existing settlements requires government permits?
Doesn’t all construction everywhere require permits?
AFAIK, yes. Which is why it sounded rather odd to me when you said “the Israeli government doesn’t expand settlements”. Yes, I get it that the initial impetus for expansion is coming from the settlers themselves rather than from a top-down government decree, but ISTM that by issuing official construction permits, the Israeli government is definitely condoning and supporting settlement expansion.
The same Jews who lived in 1948 are returning now? Or are you claiming that all Jews have a general right to return to places which Jews were living in 1948? And does that right extend to other ethnicities such as, say, Palestinians who lived in Israel before 1948.
This is false. According to Wiki:
The settlements are also fairly clearly illegal under international law. I don't know of a single government, including the US, which accepts Israeli claims of the legality of the settlements. UNSC resolutions are also pretty clear. For example resolution 465:
Pretty much the same and only rational conclusion I got from his post – of course, I haven’t yet tried reading it upside down and sideways.
It’s treating them the same way it treats any other Israeli town. “Condong construction” is normal government business; *stopping *construction, OTOH, is a big deal, and a massive political undertaking.
I was watching a documentary about Palestine last year and it featured a bunch of children who got to go to the site of the village their parents and grandparents lived in until 1967. It was a bit odd to hear children proclaim that this was their “home” even though it was the first time they had seen it and nobody in their family had occupied it for about 40 years.
Odesio
Some of them are most likely the same as the people who were chased off in 1948, some are most likely their descendants, some are most likely simply other Israelis. You want to do the cite hunting to find the exact demographics down to the last man, woman and child? Didn’t think so.
Your comparison is also a bit nutty. I might as well ask “Do you believe that the Arabs can ethnicly cleanse Jews and then prevent Jews from moving back to the land once a new sovereign is administrating it.”
Interesting, of course, that your question totally ignored the actual issue, which is that some of the ‘settlements’ represent Jews returning to areas which were Jewish for centuries and which were ethnicly cleansed as little as a couple decades before they moved back. Ah well.
What a silly thing to argue when you provide your own refutation. Why on Earth would you do that?
You just cited something that says it’s true. Approximately 66% of the land was not privately owned, that’s a 2:1 ratio. That’s the vast majority any way you slice it.
Or is this just a nitpick? It’s not the vast majority, it’s the clear majority? It’s not the clear majority, it’s the blatant majority? It’s not the blatant majority, it’s the obvious majority?
No, they’re not. That’s why UNSC 242 called for a negotiated settlement and why the Palestinians themselves have (partially, in the past) accepted negotiation as a means of resolving land disputes rather than unilateral demands. .
And coincidentally you forget to mention UNSC 242. Of course, it’s a moot point as none of them were binding resolutions, but ah well.
To the op:yes, Israel will dismantle illegal outposts.
Will others that Israel considers legal be forcibly evacuated? Maybe some but certainly not all. And I am not so sure that even dismantling them all would satisfy Hamas.
Will Israel actually stop expansion of those they consider legal (including natural growth)? Not until some pressure is brought to bear and I think that you will see that pressure gradually applied over the next six months.
It is odd indeed; but the very existence of Israel is based on an exactly similar claim.