Unlike Israeli settlers, Palestinians were evicted from their own homes and homeland, not from lands illegally seized and settled by their government.
George E. Bisharat: Enforce a Ban on Settlements: "August 27 / 28, 2005 | In the Wake of Gaza | By GEORGE E. BISHARAT

Palestinians observed Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip with a mix of contradictory emotions. Paramount, perhaps, was relief. Nearly 9,000 Israeli settlers, who had occupied a third of the land there while confining 1. 3 million Palestinians to the rest, were finally gone.

But, as images of anguished settler families torn from their homes played across televisions the world over, some felt an odd sense of compassion as well. As one Palestinian friend remarked to me, 'We, above all, understand the pain of exile and homelessness.' She was referring not only to Israeli military actions in the Gaza Strip -- where nearly 5,000 homes have been partially or fully destroyed in the last five years alone (according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics), rendering about 20,000 Palestinians homeless -- but also to the events of 1948, when 750,000 Palestinians fled in fear or were forced into exile by the new Jewish state.

Unlike Israeli settlers, Palestinians were evicted from their own homes and homeland, not from lands illegally seized and settled by their government. Nor are Palestinians treated with kid gloves by the Israeli military. Most receive but minutes notice before demolitions, any resistance is met with lethal force; a few have been buried in the rubble of their own homes. Palestinians have not received compensation for their losses, while Jewish settlers are receiving new homes and $200,000 to $500,000 per family. Palestinian suffering has not been as minutely chronicled by the world's media as has that of Jewish settlers."
- posted by Editor @ 4:10 PM

Israel boosts W.Bank settlers while quitting Gaza - "represents a declaration of war"
Israel boosts W.Bank settlers while quitting Gaza - Yahoo! News: "By Ori Lewis Fri Aug 26, 6:13 AM ET

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The population of Jewish settlements in the West Bank has grown this year by more than the 9,000 settlers evacuated under a plan to cede some occupied land, an Israeli government official said on Friday.

Thousands of Israelis have streamed into larger West Bank settlements since the start of the year, increasing the number of Jews living on occupied land to 246,000, said the Interior Ministry official, who declined to be identified.
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"Israel's insistence on expanding settlements represents a declaration of war against the Palestinians because it aims to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state by reinforcing and prolonging occupation," Palestinian cabinet minister Ghassan al-Khatib said.
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An additional 200,000 Jews live in Arab East Jerusalem, also captured in 1967. Palestinians, numbering 240,000 in East Jerusalem, want it for the capital of a future state. Israel annexed it in a move not recognized internationally.
- posted by Editor @ 11:04 PM

Sharon pledges to expand in West Bank
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Sharon pledges to expand in West Bank: "Chris McGreal in Netzarim | Tuesday August 23, 2005 | The Guardian

As Israeli forces removed residents from the last Jewish settlement still to be cleared in the Gaza Strip yesterday, Ariel Sharon sought to win back support from the Israeli right by promising continued expansion of Israel's West Bank colonies and no more unilateral pullouts.
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The newspaper said Mr Sharon specifically mentioned further construction in Ma'ale Adumim settlement, designed to link it to Jerusalem despite Washington's objections. He said that Ariel settlement, in the heart of the West Bank, would be annexed as "a part of Israel for ever". The prime minister also said there would be no further unilateral withdrawals. ...
- posted by Editor @ 3:27 PM

600 Gaza settlers to move to W Bank
Aljazeera.Net - 600 Gaza settlers to move to W Bank: "600 Gaza settlers to move to W Bank | Sunday 21 August 2005, 11:56 Makka Time, 8:56 GMT

At least 600 Jewish settlers to be evacuated from the Gaza Strip will move to a West Bank settlement, an official in the settlement said on Sunday.

The Gaza settlement of Netzarim is scheduled to be evacuated on Monday, one of the last in the pullout that began last week. In the interest of keeping Netzarim residents together, most will move to dormitories of a college in the West Bank settlement of Ariel, where they will live for at least a few months, said Yigal Cohen-Orgad, the college's chairman.

"When they appealed to us over the weekend, we were happy to give them the option of moving in," Cohen-Orgad told Israel Radio.
- posted by Editor @ 7:48 PM

There was no 'sensitivity training' when bulldozers went into Rafah: contrast minimal reporting of larger and more brutal evictions in previous months
Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | The settlers' retreat was the theatre of the cynical: "Jonathan Steele | Friday August 19, 2005 | The Guardian

There was no 'sensitivity training' when bulldozers went into Rafah

Contrast the world's overwhelming coverage, especially on television, of the departure of Israeli settlers from Gaza with the minimal reporting of larger and more brutal evictions in previous months.

There was no 'sensitivity training' for Israeli troops, no buses to drive the expellees away, no generous deadlines to get ready, no compensation packages for their homes, and no promise of government-subsidised alternative housing when the bulldozers went into Rafah.

Within sight of the Gush Katif settlements that have been handled with such kid gloves this week, families in Rafah were usually given a maximum of five minutes' warning before their houses, and life savings, were crushed. Many people did not even have time to go upstairs to collect belongings when the barking of loudspeakers ordered them out, sometimes before dawn. Fleeing with their children in the night, they risked being shot if they turned round or delayed."
- posted by Editor @ 9:33 PM

Israel's withdrawal is both historic and deceptive: Israeli settler-colonists are dangerous predators in territorial terms and ugly anachronisms
The Daily Star - Opinion Articles - Israel's withdrawal is both historic and deceptive: "By Rami G. Khouri | Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Politically, the Israeli evacuation from the Gaza Strip that started Monday is significant, and potentially historic. Morally, for the Israeli government and the settler-colonists, it is a pile of garbage, deception and lies. Sorting out the significant from the merely sinful in this situation is useful for discerning whether or not better days lie ahead.

The Israeli colonization of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, the Golan Heights and other occupied Arab lands is a crime, by at least three compelling measures. It is explicitly prohibited by international law and the 4th Geneva Convention's proscription of an occupying power moving its civilians into the lands it occupies. It is condemned by name in dozens of UN Security Council and General Assembly resolutions. And it is rejected by the bilateral policies of the entire community of nations, which refuses to acknowledge Israeli sovereignty in the occupied lands.

Israeli settler-colonists are dangerous predators in territorial terms, and ugly anachronisms in historical terms. They represent the last, lingering link to a form of 19th century European colonialism that is now universally seen to be based on the racist principle that white Europeans could steal the lands of any other people in the world, because the darker natives in southern lands had lesser rights as human beings. There are very few active colonial enterprises left in the world these days. Israel's is the most dramatic example of this movement that once included grotesque European assaults on India, South Africa, South America, Southeast Asia and North Africa.

Therefore the widespread press depictions of the Gaza settlers' 'emotional pain' at being sent back to their own country of Israel lack both credibility and relevance. Forcing a thief to stop stealing is not an act that should be depicted as inflicting pain on the criminal, but rather as forcing the criminal to abide by the law. ...
- posted by Editor @ 7:52 PM

Israel sets West Bank settlement expansion: 'This is a provocation not only to the Palestinian people but also to the international community,'
Reuters AlertNet - Israel sets West Bank settlement expansion: "04 Aug 2005 08:54:39 GMT | Source: Reuters

JERUSALEM, Aug 4 (Reuters) - Israel revealed plans on Thursday to build 72 housing units in a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, despite a call by a U.S.-backed peace 'road map' for a halt to settlement expansion.

A spokesman for Israel's Housing Ministry, which invited bids for the project in a newspaper notice, said construction in the ultra-Orthodox settlement of Betar Ilit, near the Palestinian city of Bethlehem, could start within a year.

'This is a provocation not only to the Palestinian people but also to the international community,' said Palestinian Planning Minister Ghassan al-Khattib.

Peace Now, the Israeli settler watchdog group, said the new project came in addition to a plan announced last year to build 600 housing units at Betar Ilit.

'It means that the policy of building in the territories continues despite the clear commitment in the road map not to build there,' Yariv Oppenheimer, a Peace Now spokesman said." ...
- posted by Editor @ 6:24 PM