But for the Jewish state, the settlements are eminently sensible and their growth is almost certain to continue, either openly or stealthily. As Interior Minister Eli Yishai put it Aug. 10, expanding settlements near Jerusalem is vital for "security, national interests, and is just and necessary."
Every new Jewish apartment complex enlarges and deepens the Jewish
footprint on occupied land. The California-style townhouses atop the
hills of ancient Samaria and Judea are seen as security buffers for an
Israeli island in a hostile Islamic sea. Israel's feeling of vulnerability is intensified by the growing Arab population already within its borders.
The settlements have become affordable suburbs for Israelis otherwise
priced out of the metropolitan markets. More than 300,000 Jewish
settlers now call the West Bank home.
Further, religious and ultrareligious Jewish settlers insist they have
divinely bestowed title to the land. Few passages in the Bible are more
frightening to Arabs than Deuteronomy 11:24: "Every place whereon the
soles of your feet shall tread shall be yours: from the wilderness and
Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even unto the uttermost sea shall your coast be."
Palestinian Arabs are too weak to legally or militarily challenge the
Jewish state's internal expansion. An Israeli court recently ruled that
Israel can now confiscate land belonging to Palestinians who once
resided in an area but are now refugees pending final settlement.
Having lived in Jerusalem for five years during the salad days of the
peace process in the 1990s, I watched settlement builders nibble away
at what were once Palestinian homes, villages, and pastures.
From Jerusalem southward, the construction of the Har Homa settlement
crabs outward to the doorsteps of Palestinian Bethlehem. From the air,
these settlements appear a terrestrial octopus, extending out to
ultimately link up with the more militant Jewish settlements farther
south in Hebron, another city with a large Palestinian majority.
Settlement building resembles military flanking and encirclement
maneuvers, isolating Palestinian population centers. In Jerusalem,
there are at least half a dozen Arab neighborhoods, including the Mount
of Olives, threatened by Israel's voracious hunger for land. Quoted in
the newspaper Haaretz, Sarah Kreimer of Ir Amim, a group specializing in Israeli-Palestinian relations, says, "In each of these places, plans
are being advanced for construction whose ultimate purpose is to
disconnect the Old City from Palestinian Jerusalem."
Israelis
have brilliantly created a sense of inevitability to all this. Yet, the
moral difficulties of moving indigenous peoples off the land by
subterfuge or force are obvious. When in the past I've raised the
ethical implications of these land appropriations, Israelis have dismissed me, saying, "Hey, you Americans did it to the Indians."
American presidents have often quietly nudged Israel to freeze the
settlements, but their actual leverage has been minimal. Israelis have
elected both doves and hawks as prime minister, but virtually all
Israeli governments supported settlement expansion in varying degrees.
Jewish political clout in America ought not be underestimated. A former
chairman of the American Israel Political Action Committee once boasted
to me, "We got [Sen.] Chuck Percy [an Illinois Republican who was
narrowly defeated in 1984] when he crossed us on the Palestinians."
President Obama will face a similar threat at election time if he
defies Israel's expansionist instincts.
US presidents have so frequently pledged unshakable support for Israel
that it's created the illusion that US and Israeli interests are
identical. It might be useful for Mr. Obama and his Middle East team to
publicly point to serious differences with Israel when they arise. If
the US can have public disagreements with its allies, including
Britain, why should Israel be exempted from what could be a healthy
debate?
Jewish settlement construction may temporarily
downshift into neutral. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton may
hail "a building freeze." But if the past is prologue, the first time
Obama is distracted by another domestic or international crisis, and
Washington isn't looking, the Israeli bulldozers will be back at work.
Walter Rodgers served as the CNN bureau chief in Jerusalem for 5-1/2 years. He writes a biweekly column for the Monitor's weekly edition.