Adding to Ahmed Moor’s piece above, I’d like to add this about the New York Times investigative piece on settlements being funded by tax deductible contributions. First, it’s a great victory, that the Times even did the piece, and it should be celebrated and congratulated. It’s great. Times, you came through for me!
But I too noted some distortion in the piece, specifically the assertion that the real problem is the settlements deep in the West Bank, while the ones around Jerusalem are hunky-dory.
Notice how the piece regularly states that Those Good Settlements will be Israel’s forever. Guess what, they’re all illegal, they carve up the West Bank, etc. etc. They encircle Jerusalem per the dream of Jewish nationalists… Emphasis mine:
Most contributions go to large, established settlements close to the boundary with Israel that would very likely be annexed in any peace deal, in exchange for land elsewhere. So those donations produce less concern than money for struggling outposts and isolated settlements inhabited by militant settlers. Even small donations add to their permanence…
The outposts receiving tax-deductible donations — distinct from established settlements financed by Israel’s government — are illegal under Israeli law…
Israeli security officials express frustration over donations to the illegal or more defiant communities…
Most Jewish residents of the West Bank live in what amount to suburbs, with neat homes, high rises and highways to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Politically and ideologically, they are indistinguishable from Israel proper. Most will doubtless stay in any peace deal, while those who must move will most likely do so peacefully.
But in the geographically isolated settlements and dozens of illegal outposts, there are settlers who may well violently resist being moved. The prospect of an internal and deeply painful Israeli confrontation looms…
Deep inside the West Bank, in the northern region called Samaria, or Shomron, lie 30 or so settlements and unauthorized outposts, most considered sure candidates for evacuation in any deal for a Palestinian state. In terms of donations, they do not raise anywhere near the sums produced for Jerusalem or close-in settlements. But in many ways they worry security officials and the Palestinians the most, because they are so unyielding.
