Israel okays new West Bank settlement construction

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel on Fri­day approved the con­struc­tion of 3,000 homes in Jew­ish set­tle­ments on Israeli-occupied lands, a gov­ern­ment offi­cial said, draw­ing swift con­dem­na­tion from the Pales­tini­ans a day after their suc­cess­ful U.N. recog­ni­tion bid.

The Pales­tini­ans reit­er­ated their refusal to resume nego­ti­a­tions with Israel while build­ing con­tin­ues. With Israeli Prime Min­is­ter Ben­jamin Netanyahu appar­ently poised for re-election to another four-year term and insist­ing that any nego­ti­a­tions begin with­out pre­con­di­tions, prospects for an Israeli-Palestinian par­ti­tion deal appear to be going into deep freeze.

The United Nations voted over­whelm­ingly to accept a Pales­tin­ian state in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem as a non-member observer state on Thurs­day, set­ting off jubi­lant cel­e­bra­tions among Palestinians.

Israel fiercely objected to the U.N. upgrade, say­ing Pales­tin­ian state­hood could only come from direct nego­ti­a­tions and uni­lat­eral moves would harm that prospect. The Pales­tini­ans said the U.N. recog­ni­tion of a Pales­tin­ian state in the ter­ri­to­ries cap­tured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war was an attempt to sal­vage a pos­si­ble peace deal.

Pales­tin­ian Pres­i­dent Mah­moud Abbas has refused to nego­ti­ate with Israel while set­tle­ment con­struc­tion con­tin­ues, say­ing Israel’s set­tle­ment expan­sion on war-won land was mak­ing a par­ti­tion deal increas­ingly difficult.

Pales­tin­ian nego­tia­tor Saeb Erekat con­demned Israel’s announce­ment, say­ing it was “defy­ing the whole inter­na­tional com­mu­nity and insist­ing on destroy­ing the two-state solu­tion.” He said the Pales­tin­ian lead­er­ship is study­ing its options.

Abbas spokesman Nabil Abu Rdeneh also insisted ear­lier Fri­day the Pales­tin­ian posi­tion hadn’t changed, say­ing set­tle­ment build­ing “is not just ille­gal, it’s against the resolution.”

More than 500,000 Israelis have moved to the West Bank and east Jerusalem since 1967. Israel uni­lat­er­ally with­drew its sol­diers and set­tlers from Gaza in 2005, but con­tin­ues to par­tially con­trol access. The Islamic mil­i­tant group Hamas seized con­trol of the ter­ri­tory from Abbas’ con­trol in 2007 and recently gained pop­u­lar­ity after hold­ing its own fol­low­ing an eight-day Israeli mil­i­tary offen­sive aimed at stop­ping rocket fire.

The Israeli offi­cial, who spoke on con­di­tion of anonymity because he was not autho­rized to dis­cuss the sen­si­tive issue pub­licly, said Israel decided to build 3,000 apart­ments for Jews in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. He said the gov­ern­ment also decided to begin prepa­ra­tions for con­struc­tion in other areas of the West Bank, includ­ing the so-called E-1 cor­ri­dor that con­nects Jerusalem with the set­tle­ment bloc of Maaleh Adumim.

Con­struc­tion there would pose a major obsta­cle for Pales­tin­ian state­hood by cut­ting off east Jerusalem from the West Bank. Suc­ces­sive U.S. admin­is­tra­tions have pres­sured Israel not to build in E-1 where a devel­op­ment plan calls for at least 3,500 homes.

Danny Sei­de­mann, a lawyer for Ir Amim, an Israeli group that sup­ports coex­is­tence in Jerusalem, said con­struc­tion did not appear immi­nent and the Israeli announce­ment con­tained “quite a lot of drama.”

“There’s an ele­ment of stick­ing it to the Pales­tini­ans,” he said, adding that plans in E-1 were not only a slap to the Pales­tini­ans but to the Amer­i­cans who oppose them too. “E-1 is the Judg­ment Day weapon,” he said of the strate­gic impact of con­struc­tion in that area.

Yesh Din, an Israeli rights group, called the Israeli deci­sion “col­lec­tive pun­ish­ment” and called on Israel to retract its move.

“Israel should have under­stood by now that such behav­ior … will no longer be tol­er­ated by the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity,” the group’s exec­u­tive direc­tor, Haim Erlich said.

Ear­lier this month, Israel said it was push­ing for­ward con­struc­tion of 1,200 new homes in Jew­ish set­tle­ments, in an appar­ent warn­ing to the Pales­tini­ans to rethink their U.N. plan. Israel fears the Pales­tini­ans will use their upgraded sta­tus to con­front Israel in inter­na­tional bod­ies and pres­sure it to make concessions.

For­mer For­eign Min­is­ter Tzipi Livni, the one-time chief nego­tia­tor with the Pales­tini­ans, also slammed the decision.

“The deci­sion at the U.N. on a Pales­tin­ian state is bad for Israel and so is Netanyahu’s response,” said Livni, who this week formed a new party to com­pete in Jan. 22 par­lia­men­tary elec­tions. “The deci­sion to build thou­sands of hous­ing units as pun­ish­ment to the Pales­tini­ans only pun­ishes Israel … the unnec­es­sary state­ment only iso­lates Israel further.”

In the U.N., only nine states opposed the Pales­tin­ian bid, includ­ing Israel and the United States, while 138 sup­ported it.

The vote granted Abbas an over­whelm­ing inter­na­tional endorse­ment for his key posi­tion: estab­lish­ment of a Pales­tin­ian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem. Netanyahu opposes a full pull­back to the 1967 lines.

The Pales­tini­ans turned to the U.N. after two decades of on-again, off-again talks.

Netanyahu dis­missed the U.N. vote as mean­ing­less and accused Abbas of deliv­er­ing a “defam­a­tory and ven­omous” U.N. speech “full of men­da­cious pro­pa­ganda” against Israel.

Posted by Matt Echelberry on Nov 30 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.