Netanyahu promises thousands of new housing units in West Bank, East Jerusalem

[azurnoir]

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised to approve thousands of new residential units in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to a report in the Maariv daily. According to the report, Netanyahu’s decision comes after a series of “secret agreements” made between him and Naftali Bennett, whose Jewish Home members threatened to leave the coalition after Netanyahu announced the release of Palestinian prisoners as part of peace negotiations.

According to Maariv, the agreements were shuttled between Netanyahu and Bennett by Housing Minister Uri Ariel (Jewish Home), and delivered by hand in order to prevent them from leaking and potentially harming the renewed peace talks.

http://972mag.com/nstt_feeditem/report-netanyahu-promises-thousands-of-new-housing-units-in-west-bank-e-jerusalem/


below is a translated version of Maariv's article


Netanyahu and the Jewish Home conclude: the release of terrorists for thawing construction

Senior officials in the Jewish home related that these secret agreements are responsible for the relative calm that has government decision to release Palestinian terrorists. According to them, the agreements between Netanyahu and Ariel relate primarily to communities that are within the settlement blocs in Judea and Samaria and Jerusalem projects. Understanding signed on yet finalized, but apparently has been approved for construction in the near future thousand housing units, and in the coming months will be added to them between 3500 to 4,500 additional units. meeting of the faction of the Jewish home held last Monday asked the party's Knesset members not to release in the near future threats to leave the coalition, as being formulated in light of understanding the construction party has no intention to retire from it. "The test will be if Netanyahu fails summaries on construction in the coming months", explained the party. "This is the index for us, and only by this we will decide our course of action in the future."

http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/495/143.html?hp=1&cat=404&loc=1

http://translate.google.com/?sl=en#iw/en/

[Jefferson23]

1. It's so sad, unbearable to watch any longer.

[A] large majority of Israelis have already accepted the idea of leaving the West Bank….They have forced their government unilaterally to define the proximate border with the West Bank by completing the construction of the separation barrier that incorporates 8.5 percent of the West Bank[1] and leaves most of the settlements on the other side.[2] Polls show they would support the territorial arrangements for the West Bank in the Clinton parameters provided that the settlement blocs are incorporated into Israel.[3] Moreover, Clinton’s proposal that the Arab suburbs of Jerusalem be in Palestinian hands and the Jewish suburbs in Israeli hands[4] is no longer heretical, as it was when Barak first proposed it at Camp David.[5]

…

Ideally, Israeli and Palestinian leaders would have the courage to stand in front of their people and explain that in order to achieve peace both have bitter pills to swallow: Palestinians would have to give up their claim to a right of return to Israel in return for the implementation of that right in the Palestinian homeland; Israelis would have to concede their claim to Arab parts of Jerusalem.



From Martin Indyk, Innocent Abroad: An intimate account of American diplomacy in the Middle East (New York: 2009), pp. 408-9, 413



In other words, Palestinians must forfeit 9.5 percent of the territory to which they have legal title, depriving the Palestinian state of critical land and water resources and fragmenting what remains; they must forfeit their legal title to East Jerusalem, which constitutes the hub of Palestinian life; and they must forfeit their legal right of return. On the other side, Israel must forfeit control of Palestinian territory to which it has no legal claim and the population it has all along wanted to be rid of.



http://normanfinkelstein.com/2013/new-middle-east-envoy-martin-indyks-solution-to-the-israel-palestine-conflict/

[shira]

2. It all stops once Abbas agrees to peace, 2-states, and end-of-conflict....

Our post-zionist friend from Israel here agrees with me that Abbas should have accepted Olmert's sincere offer of 2008, which would have given the Palestinians pretty much everything they say they want.

If you're sincere about peace and 2-states, you should be questioning why Abbas walked away from that offer. Instead, like him, you support settlements and an occupation that should have ended 5 years ago.

[azurnoir]

3. explain exactly how "it would have ended 5 years ago":)

[shira]

4. That's what a final 2-state peace agreement means...

End of occupation, end of settlements post- land swaps.

What's difficult about this?

[Jefferson23]

5. Save it.

The Palestinians are screwed, period.

Hold onto your alleged sincerity for any newbie who may come across your path.

[shira]

6. So the Palestinians would've screwed themselves had they agreed to Olmert's 2008 offer?

Pretty much everything they say they wanted (land based on 67' lines, E.Jerusalem as capital, refugees, etc.) was just a bullshit screw job they had every right to walk away from w/o making a counter-offer?