Peace Now brings effective tactics against government and settlements
Israel, Politics, 1/3/1998

In addition to calls on Israelis to boycott products of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, the Israeli left decided to move the battle against unemployment to those settlements. Late last week, Peace Now movement organized a tour of some 20 Israeli residents of Dimona, most of whom are unemployed, to West Bank settlements showing them where the real money goes instead of being invested in projects that could minimize the growth of unemployment in the country.

Last month, Palestinian activists and left wing Israelis issued a joint call to boycott products of Jewish settlements in what in the beginning was seen as a propaganda ploy but a few days later, spokesmen from various settlements expressed their concern that such a campaign would cause them major losses.

Dimona, located in the middle of the southern desert near Israel's maximum security nuclear reactor, is known for its high rate of unemployment. A cluster of other towns in Israel face the same problem and as the unemployment rate rose to approximately 10 percent by the end of last month. Jewish settlements have become a target for opposition groups that hope to explain to residents of those towns, usually supporters of the right, that the present Israeli government's priorities are responsible for their hardships.

Peace Now secretary Mosi Raz said the aim of the tour is ³to underline the government¹s priorities: the money is being poured into 3 percent of the nation, instead of into the fight against unemployment.² As the tour bus traveled through the underground tunnel that Israel opened last year to connect the Jewish settlements in the Hebron area with Jerusalem, Raz told the tour: ³This road was built at a cost of US $40 million, although a slim percentage of the population travels on it. At the same time, on the red road between Dimona and Beersheva the government is carrying out slow repairs investing US $3 million at a time.² And when the tour arrived in the settlement of Eli, halfway between Jerusalem and Nablus, Raz told the unemployed tourists that there are at least 700 empty and neglected homes in the settlement but at the same time the government continues to build here at low prices.²

"It is a governmental crime against our people," said one of those on the tour, saying that it is completely unfair for the Israeli government to give those settlements a special status when their population is less than 5 percent of Israel's population. Notwithstanding the political debate about the presence of the settlements, for those unemployed it is a question of survival. Many said the government should invest in building industrial zones in their towns and not in the settlements. Said Raz: "Those isolated settlements are made eligible for development, while the government closes factories in development towns.²

Spokesman of the Jewish settlements council in the West Bank , Pinchas Wallerstein, condemned the tour and said that Peace Now is "inciting the Israeli public against the settlements." He claimed that the facts are different from what is presented by the left opposition and said that no one is building even a single house in Eli under public or government construction. "Peace Now is engaging in cheap demagoguery,² he said.

Previous Stories:
  Intifada: recollections from the past   (12/22/1997)
  Redeployment proposals partition West Bank. Mordechai's vs Sharon   (12/15/1997)
  Short skirts and falafel, a different kind of confrontation   (9/22/1997)

Please add a link on your webiste pointing to ArabicNews.com and bookmark ArabicNews.com & subscribe to our daily email news bulletin.

Search