Israel plans biggest settlement in West Bank
Palestine-Israel, Politics, 3/15/2006

Israel has quietly started what is widely believed to be the largest settlement project in the West Bank since 1967.

Israeli officials revealed that Israel was building a "police headquarters" and "other facilities" in the so-called E-1 area, extending from East Jerusalem to the colony of Ma'ali Adomim, the largest Jewish settlement in the West Bank.

The planned settlement includes a net of roads, six hotels, one park in addition to 3500 settler units.No non-Jews would be allowed to live or buy land in the settlement.

"This project has received all the necessary authorization and work on the foundation began several days ago," an unnamed official in the Israeli Prime Minister's office has been quoted as saying.

The decision to start building was taken by the Higher Zoning Council for Settlements, an annex to the Israeli Army's Civil Administration. Palestinian officials have no doubt that Israel is embarking on a new phase of "large-scale theft of our land."

"They are stealing our land in broad daylight. They are killing any remaining possibility for the creation of a viable Palestinian state. And they are doing it as America and Europe are watching passively," said Khalid Al-Qawasmi, the outgoing Palestinian Authority (PA) Minister of Local Governance.

He told IRNA that the PA was in contact with the Quartet (UN, US, EU and Russia) over the issue, adding that if the international community allowed Israel to carry out the new settlement expansion plan, the two-state solution would be doomed irreversibly.

"This plan would truncate the West Bank into three isolated enclaves, and no Palestinian would come to terms with this," Al- Qawasmi accused Israel of deceiving the international community, by effectively killing the US-backed Roadmap peace plan while claiming to be adhering to it

In fact, Israel has been saying for years that it intends to build as many thousands of settler units in the area between Jerusalem and Ma'ali Adomim in order to create a Jewish demographic continuity in the area. The settlement, says Khalil Tufakji, a settlement expert at the Arab Studies' Center in East Jerusalem, will cut off Jerusalem from its Arab surroundings and irreversibly kill any chance for a viable Palestinian state in the West Bank.

"This will also effectively cut off the southern West Bank (the Hebron and Bethlehem regions) from the central and northern regions." Meanwhile, acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has vowed to keep the settlement of Ariel, the second largest Jewish colony in the West Bank, "within Israel" in any prospective settlement with the Palestinians.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I want to be clear on this, the Ariel block will be an inseparable part of the state of Israel under any situation," he told settlers and supporters at the settlement Tuesday. Ariel was built in the heartland of the West Bank, southwest of Nablus.

Previous Stories:
  Palestinians ask Red Cross help from Israel's attack on Jericho Prison   (3/14/2006)
  The Independent: Israelis warned of illegality of 1967 settlements   (3/11/2006)
  Israel wounds Palestinian family   (3/10/2006)
  World Council of Churches call for end of illegal Israeli occupation   (3/10/2006)
  Israel kills six Palestinians   (3/7/2006)
  Israeli occupation arrest campaigns   (3/3/2006)
  Qurei: Israel's decision is 'theft in broad daylight' of Palestinian land   (7/12/2005)

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