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del.icio.us Digg It!  new Last update - 10:20 22/11/2006 A settlements mafia By Dror Etkes The figures published yesterday by Peace Now's Settlement Watch team on the ownership of land on which the settlements sit presents a scary picture of the State of Israel's behavior in the territories. Approximately 40 percent of the area of settlements is privately-owned Palestinian land, according to the Civil Administration. Put simply, for dozens of years, Israel continued to expand and entrench the settlement enterprise by dispossessing Palestinian residents of their lands, whose private ownership even the State of Israel does not dispute. All of this is in contrast to the frequently voiced argument of official government spokesmen and settlers that "the settlements sit on state lands." What is the method used to bring about this phenomenon? From 1967 to 1979, the Israeli military administration in the West Bank made widespread use of the process of "acquiring land for security purposes" to grab thousands of dunams of land under private Palestinian ownership. These lands were in practice used for the purpose of expanding the settlements. Although "acquiring land for security purposes" in an occupied area is permitted according to international law, it is also limited to a certain time. The High Court of Justice rejected the petitions the landowners submitted against the acquisitions, basing itself on the argument that the settlements do indeed have an added security value, as they are located in the heart of an area where a hostile population lives. That is, permanent settlements were established on lands whose acquisition was meant to have been temporary to begin with. To this day, dozens of settlements owe their legal existence to the absurd ritual in which the OC Central Command signs an extension of the acquisition orders for the lands on which they sit, while declaring that he is convinced the land in question is "necessary for military purposes." Advertisement Ironically, this method of operation eventually ran into trouble specifically because of the settlers' refusal to continue cooperating with the open lie at the heart of all those declarations the IDF provided to the High Court of Justice. In a response submitted by the settlers in 1979, when the High Court of Justice was discussing land acquisitions for Elon Moreh, it was actually the settlers who refused to recognize the temporary nature of the settlement they were about to set up, arguing that it was not being set up for the purpose of temporary security needs, but as a "supreme moral and divine order." With no alternative available, the High Court of Justice was compelled to overturn its previous decisions and to order the state to refrain from acquiring lands intended for building settlements. Even though Elon Moreh had to relocate to an alternate site, all the settlements that had been established in this manner until that point remained where they were. As a result of the Elon Moreh case, the construction of settlements in the territories, which only accelerated during those years, switched to two parallel tracks: the first, the pseudo-legal one, in which the government of Israel, assisted by the legal advice from the industrious Plia Albeck, declared huge tracts of the West Bank to be state lands. And in that way, without Israeli governments ever having to provide any sort of accounting, not for the questionable way in which these lands were declared state lands, nor for the very fact that these land were allocated only for Jews (even though they were and remain a small minority of the West Bank population), the settlement enterprise became entrenched. The second track on which Israel worked represents a more advanced stage in the government's scorn for the concept of its subordination to the laws of the state, whose enforcement, or so it is commonly thought, it is actually supposed to oversee: the governments of Israel continued to initiate or "only" to enable the construction of settlements, neighborhoods and outposts on private lands without even bothering to issue acquisition orders, because after all, the High Court of Justice would probably have disqualified them. As mentioned, all of this happened with the knowledge of the Civil Administration, which did not get lazy and took the trouble to document the phenomenon and its dimensions, while insolently insisting on its right to conceal it from the public. And this is what the Jerusalem District Prosecutor's Office wrote to the court when explaining its refusal to hand over the data: "The subject of the petition is an extremely sensitive issue that involves, among other things, the State of Israel's security considerations and foreign relations." Even though it is hard to understand what "security considerations" could have been involved in this matter, it is easy to guess how Israel's foreign relations would indeed have been affected by the information contained here. The unfortunate conclusion is that when it comes to land management policy, the State of Israel acts like a mafia state inside the area of the West Bank. The author is the director of Peace Now's Settlement Watch project. 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Tehran to Tel Aviv A Christian-Jewish group is promising dozens of Iranian Jews a better life in Israel.   1.   Settlers are the mirror of the (bad) Israeli image of today 11:04  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   2.   How can stealing be "security"? 11:13  |  Marilyn 22/11/06   3.   Greed and corruption aren`t ok??? 11:20  |  Natallie Durson 22/11/06   4.   To Swiss (Dino) 11:25  |  Old Swiss 22/11/06   5.   Peace now is mistaken 11:34  |  Altalena 22/11/06   6.   Zionism, Switzerland & image 12:08  |  justajew 22/11/06   7.   # 4 Old Swiss 12:14  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   8.   if Israel has a future ..... 12:17  |  flimflam 22/11/06   9.   Success of Zionism 12:27  |  Altalena 22/11/06   10.   Laws of Ownership ( As I said before & never got POSTED) 13:05  |  Mary 22/11/06   11.   If Dino says the ``settlers" are bad, they must be great 13:06  |  Steven 22/11/06   12.   THERE WILL BE NO PEACE UNTIL THE JEWISH MESSIAH ?? 13:13  |  Bill. 22/11/06   13.   A Piss Now Mafia project at the service of arab ennemy 13:14  |  Joseph E . 22/11/06   14.   #4 Altalena is mistaken (2) 13:26  |  zmogus 22/11/06   15.   to no 9 Altena 13:36  |  raj 22/11/06   16.   This isn`t a suprise 13:49  |  Abba 22/11/06   17.   #4 Old and wise Swiss. It`s touching, but... 13:59  |  zmogus 22/11/06   18.   #4 Altalena is mistaken (1) (again) 14:15  |  zmogus 22/11/06   19.   altalena 14:15  |  Fiona 22/11/06   20.   13. thank you, Joseph E. 14:19  |  whoopsie 22/11/06   21.   Success of Altalena 14:20  |  goo 22/11/06   22.   Abu Dis on Jewish land ?? 14:31  |  Dan Wittenberg 22/11/06   23.   Arrogance, Lies, Deception and a Mafia Strong Hand 14:35  |  Yaakov Sullivan 22/11/06   24.   No. 10 14:38  |  W 22/11/06   25.   #9 Altalena. Besides your irrelevancy to the article... 14:39  |  zmogus 22/11/06   26.   An ugly face in the mirror 14:39  |  Lena 22/11/06   27.   Zionist mafia and every one else who benefits from it 14:50  |  John Spear 22/11/06   28.   zionist mafia and all the others who benefit 14:53  |  John Spear 22/11/06   29.   Zionist mafia etc, n, 2 14:55  |  John Spear 22/11/06   30.   To Zmogus in Vilnius. Who is right ? 14:55  |  Altalena 22/11/06   31.   Dan Wittenberg on the Jews in Abu Dis #22 15:00  |  Yaakov Sullivan 22/11/06   32.   To Zmogus & Raj. The ottoman empire 15:05  |  Altalena 22/11/06   33.   Mary of Boston, and especially if you...#10 15:14  |  Yaakov Sullivan 22/11/06   34.   A settlement mafia 15:17  |  I. Barr 22/11/06   35.   Jewish properties 15:23  |  Altalena 22/11/06   36.   Settler land grab 15:26  |  Michael Katz 22/11/06   37.   John Spear (Post No. 27 and 28) 15:33  |  Johnny Weintraub 22/11/06   38.   To Zmogus. Legality (last try) 15:40  |  Altalena 22/11/06   39.   Eminent Domain 15:41  |  Johnny Weintraub 22/11/06   40.   mAfia news you wouldn`t find on Ha`aretz 15:44  |  niccolo 22/11/06   41.   #28 SPEAR MISSES THE MARK BY A MILE 15:46  |  paul harris 22/11/06   42.   mafia settlements 37 15:55  |  John Spear 22/11/06   43.   #22, Dan Wittenberg. Interesting (although not equitable) fact 16:07  |  zmogus 22/11/06   44.   Altalena and his denials 16:11  |  Danite 22/11/06   45.   Peace Now 16:18  |  Danite 22/11/06   46.   # 41 paul harris The Palestinians owe you a big hug.... 16:23  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   47.   # 39 Johnny Weintraub @ Sugar Land / Texas / USA 16:32  |  Joseph E . 22/11/06   48.   Who is paying your Salary? INVESTIGATE PEACE NOW 16:39  |  Sam Weinstein 22/11/06   49.   # 44 # 45 Danite 16:44  |  Joseph E . 22/11/06   50.   # 11 Steven What is a right-winger like you.... 17:05  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   51.   Dino the Swiss Cheese Guy 17:09  |  Gabe1 22/11/06   52.   Peace NOW forgets something 17:13  |  Bruriah Sarah 22/11/06   53.   48 - Peace Now is funded by EU 17:15  |  Bruriah Sarah 22/11/06   54.   36 - Settlements are legal 17:17  |  Bruriah Sarah 22/11/06   55.   Reply to Joseph E (Post No. 47) 17:17  |  Johnny Weintraub 22/11/06   56.   # 48 Sam Weinstein 17:24  |  Joseph E . 22/11/06   57.   #32, 38, Altalena. To begin with... 17:24  |  zmogus 22/11/06   58.   Eminent Domain 17:25  |  Dave 22/11/06   59.   #53 If that is True does that make them Spies 17:27  |  Sam Weinstein 22/11/06   60.   # 51 Gabe 1 What happened over night ?? 17:38  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   61.   Not a Mafia state but an Apartheid state 17:41  |  Tosefta 22/11/06   62.   PEOPLE AREN`T GOING TO ACCEPT ISRAEL`S CORRUPT SETTLEMENTS ANYMOR 17:46  |  Dutch 22/11/06   63.   #56, Sam Weinstein and the Conspiracy of Spies. 17:53  |  zmogus 22/11/06   64.   The world is doing nothing Dutch and for a reason 17:59  |  British academic 22/11/06   65.   #62 DORIS THE ALL MUNICIFENT SPEAKS FOR ALL THE PEOPLE EVERYWHERE 18:01  |  paul harris 22/11/06   66.   Dutch 18:06  |  Shira 22/11/06   67.   # 61 Tosefta 18:07  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   68.   Dino the swiss cheese guy #51 18:12  |  Gabe1 22/11/06   69.   62 - Settlements are legal 18:16  |  Bruriah Sarah 22/11/06   70.   61:Israel is not an apartheid state 18:18  |  Bruriah Sarah 22/11/06   71.   # 55 Johnny Weintraub @ Sugar Land / Texas / USA 18:23  |  Joseph E . 22/11/06   72.   Natalie #3 18:28  |  Gabe1 22/11/06   73.   #63 THE TRUTH HURTS DOESN`T IT 18:35  |  Sam Weinstein 22/11/06   74.   # 65 Gabe 1 18:42  |  Swiss (Dino) 22/11/06   75.   Buriah Sarah 18:57  |  Joseph E . 22/11/06   76.   The painful, and the impossible (Swiss 64) 19:03  |  Tosefta 22/11/06   77.   Anyone who messes with the Yids, sleeps with the fishes 19:17  |  Lucky Luciano 22/11/06   78.   #63 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN STATE AND PRIVATE 19:18  |  Sam Weinstein 22/11/06   79.   59 - Response 19:19  |  Bruriah Sarah 22/11/06   80.   Altalena`s flawed logic 19:22  |  Jean-Luc Ngarambe 22/11/06   81.   SQUATTER NATION... 19:26  |  MIKE KATZ