Adam Horowitz:
After supporting the settler movement for 40 years, the Israeli government is having a hard time cracking down on it. Reuters reports that the apartheid system Israel has set up in the occupied territories (one area, two rules of law) is a detriment to law enforcement:
According to settlers and Shin Bet veterans, pressure tactics familiar to Palestinians -- from bribery to ruses to interrogation methods that civil liberties groups decry as torture -- are all available for use against Jewish detainees.
But few dispute that Jews are less likely to receive rough treatment, if only because they enjoy sovereign Israeli rights such as access to a lawyer within 48 hours of detention. By contrast, Palestinians can be more readily kept incommunicado for long periods, as the West Bank is under Israeli martial law.
"The Jew feels at home. He thinks he has more rights. He thinks he can run to the Supreme Court," a recently retired Shin Bet chief interrogator told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
"So, statistically, the moment you apply physical pressure on Jews, they get offended and clam up -- not like Arabs."
In the end it doesn't even look like the Israeli government wants to stop the settlers (or settlements), they just want them to look better:
Menachem Landow, a former Jewish Division head, said Shin Bet officers -- many of them religious Jews conversant with ultranationalist claims to biblical West Bank land -- prefer to stem settler threats through dialogue rather than crackdowns.
"The working assumption with Jews is that they're friendly unless proven otherwise, while Arabs are hostile unless proven otherwise. There's no 100 percent formula here," he said.
Looking at the tool that is "security precautions" under Bush and in Israel, I see its very useful. They've both learned from Hitler and Stalin.
And all because the Israel's is a democratic state where population is divided into human beings that have unalienable rights and into Arabs/Palestinians.
Yeah, a hard time cracking down, like a Supreme Court that ruled settlers OUT of a house to which they have undisputed legal title.
Unfortunately the Palestinian militants chose to beat children to death with rocks and shoot pregnant women, which somewhat hampers the PR that could drive "mainland" Israel to regard settlers as "less than."
There you go again, Euro. IDF rather frequently kills pregnant women and small children too, but with gunshots rather than rocks. How is that better?
No Eurochimp – there are no settlers that have undisputed legal title in the occupied territories.
They are illegal under international law – and according to the Annapolis agreement signed by Israel which stated ALL settlements are to be removed.
So cut the crap.