Today's news brings the announcement that the new Israeli government is going to continue its policy of allowing construction of new homes in Israeli towns on the West Bank, but will not permit new settlements in this area. Close to 300,000 Israelis live in these towns or "settlements" in the parlance of the Obama administration and the Palestinians. President Obama demanded during his meetings last week with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that Israel prohibit any further construction in these areas. Not surprisingly, Israel has not gone along with that nonsensical demand. After all, 300,000 citizens have children who grow up and need places to live. Imagine the US response if Israel or any other country demanded that the US bar construction in cities holding 15,000,000 American citizens (proportionately the same amount). While Obama would surely appologize for something, he would also find it compelling to allow those 15,000,000 people to continue to build new homes and businesses.
More important, Israel has no reason to believe that stopping constrution would lead to peace. Israel withdrew from Lebanon and got Hezbollah on the border in return. Israel withdrew from Gaza and got Hamas and rockets into its territory in return.
There is no need for Israel to stop its citizens from building in their towns and cities when no one can make even a reasonable case that this will lead to peace. After all, there is not even a Palestinian leader who could promise peace in a meaningful way.
No comments:
Post a Comment