{"id":89875,"date":"2017-04-03T12:00:57","date_gmt":"2017-04-03T11:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=89875"},"modified":"2017-04-01T18:55:28","modified_gmt":"2017-04-01T17:55:28","slug":"israeli-guidelines-point-to-largely-unconstrained-settlement-expansion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2017\/04\/israeli-guidelines-point-to-largely-unconstrained-settlement-expansion\/","title":{"rendered":"Israeli Guidelines Point to Largely Unconstrained Settlement Expansion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Plan outlined by Benjamin Netanyahu would allow building within boundaries of existing blocks, adjacent to them, or close to the blocs.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Israeli settlement of Maaleh Adumim looms over Arab Bedouin shacks in the West Bank. The Obama administration was swift to condemn settlements while the Trump administration has been more lenient. Photograph: Mahmoud Illean\/AP<\/p><\/div>\n

31 Mar 2017 – <\/em>Israel has indicated it will pursue a unilateral policy of largely unconstrained settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories<\/a>, as it announced the first new settlement in two decades.<\/p>\n

While Israel\u2019s new settlement construction guidelines were presented as evidence of restraint and a \u201cgoodwill gesture\u201d to the administration of US President Donald Trump \u2013 who has asked Israel to slow construction<\/a> \u2013 the details seem to indicate the opposite.<\/p>\n

Under the arrangements outlined on Thursday night by the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel<\/a> plans to build within the boundaries of existing settlements adjacent to them, and when that is \u201cnot possible\u201d, close to those blocs.<\/p>\n

The only limit would involve so-called illegal outposts built by hardline settlers without permission.<\/p>\n

The disclosure of the guidelines comes after the apparent failure of Israel and US officials to agree a road map for what settlement construction would be acceptable to the Trump administration<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The details emerged on Friday morning after the announcement on Thursday of a new settlement near Nablus \u2013 the first in almost two decades \u2013 to rehouse illegal Jewish settlers from the Amona outpost<\/a>, which was demolished on the instruction of an Israeli court.<\/p>\n

In a statement on Friday, Netanyahu said: \u201cOut of consideration to President Donald Trump\u2019s position, Israel will take necessary steps to minimise the expansion of developed area beyond the footprint of existing settlements in Judea and Samaria [the occupied Palestinian territories] and exhibit considerable restriction, to allow the progression of the peace process.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsrael will build within the existing developed area, as much as possible. In areas where this is not possible, Israel will build along the existing development line.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn areas where neither of these possibilities are feasible, due to legal, security, topographical or additional concerns, Israel will allow building in proximity as close as possible to the existing development line.\u201d<\/p>\n

The guidelines go beyond the agreement between the late Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and George W Bush for settlement construction<\/a> and far beyond what the Obama administration called for.<\/p>\n

Describing the plan, one unnamed Israeli minister told the newspaper Haaretz:<\/a> \u201cThis isn\u2019t an agreement with the Americans, but rather unilateral policy by the government of Israel. The Americans said that they don\u2019t agree with construction in the settlements in any case, but that they can live with it and there won\u2019t be an international crisis over every new home that\u2019s built.\u201d<\/p>\n

The disclosed new \u201crestrictions\u201d will not be seen as such by most of the international community, which regards Israeli settlement construction as a violation of international law.<\/p>\n

The Palestinians view the West Bank and East Jerusalem, areas captured by Israel in 1967, as parts of a future state. In December, weeks before Trump was inaugurated, President Obama allowed the UN security council to pass a resolution that declared all settlements in both areas to be illegal. Trump condemned the decision at the time.<\/p>\n

Responding to the announcement of the new settlement on Thursday night, senior Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi said the move showed the government was pushing ahead with \u201ctheir systematic policies of settler colonialism, apartheid and ethnic cleansing, showing a total and blatant disregard for Palestinian human rights\u201d.<\/p>\n

She added: \u201cIsrael is more committed to appeasing its illegal settler population than to abiding by the requirements for stability and a just peace.\u201d<\/p>\n

A spokesman for UN secretary general, Ant\u00f3nio Guterres, expressed \u201cdisappointment and alarm\u201d at the announcement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe secretary general has consistently stressed that there is no plan B for Israelis and Palestinians to live together in peace and security. He condemns all unilateral actions that, like the present one, threaten peace and undermine the two-state solution,\u201d Stephane Dujarric said in a statement.<\/p>\n

For its part the White House pointedly avoided any specific condemnation of the announcement, although it said further settlement activity \u201cdoes not help advance peace\u201d and that it expects Israel to show restraint moving forward.<\/p>\n

A White House official sought to play down Thursday\u2019s announcement, saying Netanyahu made his promise to the Amona settlers before Trump laid out his vision.<\/p>\n

The White House statement even went so far as to welcome what appears to be a limited Israeli commitment to take Trump\u2019s concerns about settlements into consideration, without any guarantees to avoid similar announcements.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the administration has made clear, while the existence of settlements is not in itself an impediment to peace, further unrestrained settlement activity does not help advance peace,\u201d the US official said. \u201cThe Israeli government has made clear that going forward, its intent is to adopt a policy regarding settlement activity that takes the president\u2019s concerns into consideration. The United States welcomes this.\u201d<\/p>\n

The relatively tepid response was a far cry from the automatic condemnations voiced by the Obama administration in reaction to Israeli settlement announcements.<\/p>\n

On the campaign trail, Trump indicated he would be far more sympathetic to settlements than Obama and the international community. His platform made no mention of an independent Palestinian state, and his inner circle includes strong supporters of the settlement movement.<\/p>\n

Since taking office, Trump has appeared to change his position, telling an Israeli newspaper last month that settlements \u201cmay not be helpful\u201d and telling Netanyahu at the White House that he would like to see some restraint. Since then, Israel and the US have been in talks over what kind of construction the White House would tolerate.<\/p>\n

_____________________________________<\/p>\n

Peter Beaumont is the<\/em> Guardian‘s<\/em> Jerusalem correspondent. He has reported extensively from conflict zones including Africa, the Balkans and the Middle East, and has reported widely on human rights issues and the impact of conflict on civilians. The winner of the George Orwell Prize for his reports from Iraq, he is the author of<\/em> The Secret Life of War: Journeys Through Modern Conflict<\/a><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

31 Mar 2017 – Israel has indicated it will pursue a unilateral policy of largely unconstrained settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories, as it announced the first new settlement in two decades. Plan outlined by Benjamin Netanyahu would allow building within boundaries of existing blocks, adjacent to them, or close to the blocs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-89875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-palestine-israel-gaza-genocide"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89875"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89875\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}