And They Wonder Why Hamas Is In Power
Please, keep giving unconditional support to these people:
JERUSALEM, Dec. 26 — For the first time in 10 years, Israel said Tuesday it will build a new Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, prompting Palestinian anger and American concern.The announcement, by the defense ministry and settler groups, seems to run counter to the prevailing effort by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who has offered a series of gestures to the Palestinians after a meeting with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, several days ago.
. . .Even before the meeting, Mr. Abbas was being criticized by his political rivals in Hamas, which preaches Israel’s destruction, for carrying out what it calls an Israeli and American agenda with little to show for it.
One Israeli official hinted that the new settlement may be part of a deal with West Bank Jewish settlers to get their tacit acceptance of the removal of illegal settlement outposts there.
Another Israeli official, however, insisted that the settlement was not “new,� exactly, but a revival of a settlement that was approved in 1981 and had become a pre-army school by the mid-1990’s.
The Defense Minister, Amir Peretz, the dovish head of the Labor Party, gave his approval to a promise made by his predecessor — Shaul Mofaz, then of Likud and now of Kadima and the current Transport Minister — that houses would be built on the site of an army base in the northern Jordan Valley to resettle some of the Israelis who were forced to leave settlements in the Gaza Strip in 2005, according to a Defense Ministry official.
. . .The new settlement will be called Maskiot, and approval was given for the construction of some 30 houses. The Israeli official insisted that all construction would be privately funded.
They will be used by the 20 families of the hawkish Gaza settlement Shirat Hayam, which resisted evacuation and wanted to move as a group. To get them to leave Gaza peacefully, the army promised to keep them together.
The decision, the official said, “sort of went through and now it’s done and would be very hard to undo.�