Trembling earth under economic peace

[bemildred]

The West Bank is returning to center stage amid expectations that the new U.S. administration will do more to push the diplomatic process between Israel and the Palestinians forward. The United States faces the old vision of two states living side by side and enjoying independence, security and prosperity. Unfortunately, this vision relies on false assumptions about the West Bank's development potential.

Israel defines around 1.6 million dunams (some 4 million acres) in the West Bank as state lands and does not allow the Palestinians to develop them. Hundreds of thousands of dunams in the West Bank have been declared "closed military zones" or "engaged" - they are off-limits to the Palestinians. Also, World Bank data suggest that 68 percent of all West Bank communities have agricultural lands that are not being used or are not accessible, for reasons including water shortages and the withholding of land by Israel. For example, more than 10 percent of cultivated agricultural land in the West Bank (which produces 8 percent of all Palestinian agricultural produce), is directly affected by the physical obstacles that separate the land from its owners.

Not only does Israeli land policy prevent Palestinian development, so does the planning policy for Area C, which is completely under Israeli control and constitutes about 60 percent of West Bank land. Full planning authority, including the issuing of building permits and blueprints, is in the hands of the Civil Administration, which furthers Israel's abusive policy in the territories. Thus, for example, the rate of building permits for Palestinians approved by the Civil Administration dropped from 97 percent in 1972 to about 5 percent in recent years. This is happening alongside land allotment and expedited development for settlement activity. Of the 149 Palestinian communities whose built-up areas lie entirely in Area C, the Civil Administration has approved the blueprints of only 15 villages. In most cases these plans only delineate the villages' areas and do not meet residents' basic needs.

The institutionalized abuse does not end at withholding building permits for villagers in Area C, but extends to a very severe form of enforcement: the razing of around 240 structures annually, on average. With the chances of receiving a building permit minimal, many Palestinians in Area C are forced to build without a permit, despite the risk that their homes might be razed. Without legal solutions for expressing their right to a roof, their human rights are being violated as the Civil Administration carries out a systematic government policy.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1078596.html

[Jefferson23]

1. In response to the OP's title,

"What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them, that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply." President Barack Hussein Obama, January 21st, 2009


For what it is worth, I still have hope.

[madrchsod]

2. the modern day israeli`s are not as bad as moses....

i must say they are showing more restraint in their conquest of the land of palestine.

[oberliner]

3. Most people who are critical of Israel are not anti-semitic

I wish there was an easy way to spot the ones who are.

[Igel]

4. Ack. Again, the entailment that 1 dunum = 4 acres.

4 million acres is 3x the area of the West Bank.

For some reason, many of the articles posted here tend to entail that 1 dunum = 4 acres, instead of 1 acre = 4 dunums.

The truth is bad enough, let's at least try to keep the errors within an order of magnitude.

[bemildred]

5. That is an error of about one order of magnitude.

But you would think that Cohen-Lifshitz would know.