New Wave Of Radical Israeli Settlers Digging In For The Long Haul In The West Bank

[Purveyor]

High on a windy limestone plateau in the ancient biblical land of Judea and Samaria is the settlement of Itamar, a Jewish bastion deep in what today is hostile Arab territory.

The farms and homes of its 230 families are protected by an electrified fence topped with barbed wire and monitored by the night vision cameras and sensors of the Israeli army. Jerusalem is within easy commuting distance by a fast road, although the drive to work can be hazardous and the past month has been more violent than usual.

Last week Palestinian youths were hurling rocks at Israeli cars, as they have done daily since last month's brief Gaza war, and they have taken it out on motorists since the Israeli government announced at the end of November that 3,000 homes are to be built in a planned settlement on a strategic chunk of the West Bank outside Jerusalem, a block of land called "E1".

--CLIP
"We're in the middle of Arab territory here, a place that a lot of Israelis are scared to come to," said Meir Rapaport, a 19-year religious student with a strong Bronx accent who arrived at Itamar from New York a year ago.

"Sometimes you get woken up at night and have to take shelter when there's a security alert, and you hear shots once in a while. My parents think I'm crazy to come here.
"When I first moved to Israel I headed for Tel Aviv and the party scene, but this is the place for me. This is our land. It says so in the Bible. You have to be ready to bleed for it and fight for it."

MORE...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/9762603/New-wave-of-radical-Israeli-settlers-digging-in-for-the-long-haul-in-the-West-Bank.html

[virtualobserver]

1. for the bible tells me so......

When God gives you an option on real estate, it never expires.....even if you're from the Bronx.

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

2. Or the Koran, Vedas and book of Mormon?

[virtualobserver]

3. unfortunately I haven't read those.....

but I would not use them as proof of land ownership either.

[Downwinder]

4. Manifest destiny.

[virtualobserver]

5. "expansion, prearranged by heaven"

[Downwinder]

6. I notice the kid is from the Bronx.

[shaayecanaan]

7. Most of them are...

most of the "ideological settlers" that give up comfortable living to squat in settlement outposts made of timber beams and galvanised steel seem to originate from the United States, and quite a few from New York.

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

8. Of course they are digging in.

I wouldn't expect them just to get up and walk away. At best their country is not motivating them to, or at worst they are encouraging them to stay.

"We're in the middle of Arab territory here, a place that a lot of Israelis are scared to come to," said Meir Rapaport, a 19-year religious student with a strong Bronx accent who arrived at Itamar from New York a year ago.

They can't even come to terms that the people they call Arabs are Palestinians. They even know it's not their land, and if they are scared to live there then why not just live within Israel's borders?


And America's politicians look the other way...

[Scootaloo]

9. I remember being nineteen

Like Meir is, I was so dedicated, so certain of what I was doing. Nothing could sway me from my vision, no argument could prove me wrong. I was invincible.

Unfortunately, a foreign nation did not see fit to fund my youthful delusions of grandeur and invincibility. But then said delusions centered around a romantic interest on the other side of a continent, and not being armed and told "go forth and conquer for god," like Meir's do, so I guess I can understand why a nation wouldn't be too interested in my youthful fantasies.