Netanyahu Says Some Settlements to Stay in Israel
By ISABEL KERSHNER
JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said Sunday that several Jewish settlement blocs in the West Bank would always remain part of Israel, a comment that upset the Palestinians even as the Obama administration’s Middle East envoy was trying to coax them back into peace talks.
The prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, helped plant a tree in a West Bank settlement near Jerusalem on Sunday.
Mr. Netanyahu spoke about the Etzion bloc on Sunday.
Although Israel has long insisted on maintaining a permanent hold over certain groups of settlements, including those Mr. Netanyahu referred to Sunday, his remarks struck a jarring note on a day when the American envoy, George J. Mitchell, shuttled between Israeli and Palestinian leaders on a so-far unsuccessful mission to restart negotiations that have been stalled for over a year.
Mr. Netanyahu took the opportunity of the approaching holiday of Tu Bishvat, a Jewish arbor day, to reaffirm Israel’s claim to the Etzion bloc of settlements just south of Jerusalem. “Our message is clear,” he said during a tree-planting ceremony there. “We are planting here, we will stay here, we will build here. This place will be an inseparable part of the State of Israel for eternity.”
The Etzion settlements were settled by Jews before the Israeli state was established in 1948. The area became part of the West Bank under Jordanian control after the 1948 war, and the settlements were destroyed. Some settlers returned there immediately after Israel captured the territory from Jordan in the 1967 war, and the settlements were rebuilt.
Earlier, in remarks before the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Mr. Netanyahu said he would also plant saplings in Maale Adumim and Ariel, two large settlement-cities that Israel also intends to keep.
He also said that Mr. Mitchell, with whom he had just met, presented what he described as “some interesting ideas” for resuming the diplomatic process with the Palestinians.
“We are very much interested in doing so, and I expressed my hope that these ideas bring this about,” Mr. Netanyahu said.
But Nabil Abu Rudaineh, a spokesman for the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, who met with Mr. Mitchell in Jordan on Sunday, said that it was “premature to talk about a real breakthrough,” according to the official Palestinian news agency, WAFA.
Mr. Abu Rudaineh added that Mr. Abbas had reassured Mr. Mitchell of his commitment to peace.
But the spokesman also condemned Mr. Netanyahu’s tree-planting as “an unacceptable act that destroys all the efforts being exerted” by Mr. Mitchell, The Associated Press reported.
The Palestinians claim all of the West Bank, as well as Gaza and East Jerusalem, for a future Palestinian state, although they have expressed readiness for minor border adjustments in return for commensurate swaps of land.
Mr. Netanyahu has offered to begin peace talks without preconditions, and in a gesture to get the Palestinians to agree, in November he announced a halt to all new residential construction in the West Bank settlements for 10 months. The move infuriated Jewish settlers, but the Palestinians dismissed the moratorium as insufficient because it allowed for the completion of about 2,500 homes already under construction and because it did not include East Jerusalem. They continue to insist on a total Israeli freeze before resuming talks.
Speaking to foreign reporters in Jerusalem last week, Mr. Netanyahu said that the Palestinian leaders had “climbed up a tree” and “they like it up there.”
Palestinian officials contend that in addition to continuing to build in the settlements, Mr. Netanyahu is trying to dictate the outcome of talks before they begin. Mr. Netanyahu has already stipulated that he will only entertain the idea of a demilitarized Palestinian state with limits on its sovereign powers.
In the session with the foreign reporters on the eve of Mr. Mitchell’s visit here, Mr. Netanyahu said that the threat of rocket smuggling into the Palestinian territories would require Israel to maintain a presence “on the eastern side of a prospective Palestinian state,” meaning along the border with Jordan.
The chief Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, responded that “the only remaining obstacle to negotiations” was “the conditions Mr. Netanyahu continues to impose.”
The Israeli demands, he added, erode “any foundation of hope for the two-state solution.”
Lees verder: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/world/middleeast/25mideast.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
7 opmerkingen:
Niet vergeten. Wij hebben ook een memorial day, woensdagmiddag Ned. 13.25, mocht je het een en ander 1 dag vergeten zijn. Duitsland weer op een fout spoor.
Last update - 22:38 25/01/2010
President Shimon Peres arrived in Berlin on Monday ahead of international Holocaust Memorial Day on Wednesday,
German firm cancels deal with Iran port due to Israeli pressure
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent
Tags: Israel news, Iran nuclear
After heavy diplomatic pressures from the Israeli government, a German construction company on Monday canceled its end of a contract to renovate the Bander Abbas Port in Iran.
Israel's ambassador to Berlin told Chancellor Angela Merkels' top aides, as well as foreign ministry officials, that Iran has been exporting weapons from that port bound for Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
lees verder Haaretz
anzi
Last update - 20:09 25/01/2010
Déjà vu
Der Spiegel: Iran able to produce nuclear bomb this year
By Haaretz Service
Tags: Israel News, Iran Nuclear
Iran is serious about developing a nuclear bomb and has the ability to produce a primitive, truck-sized version of the bomb this year, the German magaziner Der Spiegel reported on Monday.
An intelligence dossier obtained by Der Spiegel shows that there is a secret military branch of Iran's nuclear research program that answers to Tehran's ministry of defense, according to the report.
lees verder Haaretz
anzi
Feestje gegarandeerd en ze kunnen ook doden
Niet vergeten, woensdag memorial day
Tzahal 2010: Israël, geboren voor vrede!
dinsdag 13 oktober 2009
De jongens en meiden van Tzahal komen volgend jaar ook weer naar Nederland. Wat de afgelopen jaren al een daverend succes was, belooft ook dit jaar een spetterend spektakel te worden!
Schrijf alvast in je agenda:
1 februari: Drachten
3 februari: Amersfoort
4 februari: Dordrecht
Tzahal is een selectie van de meest muzikale jongeren uit het Israëlische leger. Zestig militairen worden uitgekozen om één jaar tijdens hun dienstplicht in het Tzahal Orkest mee te spelen. Dat bestaat uit voornamelijk professionele musici of veelbelovende talenten. Het orkest treedt op alle officiële gelegenheden op, en geeft concerten voor de Israëlische soldaten. Net als in de tijd van Koning David toen hij met het leger van Israël ten strijde trok en de zangers en muzikanten voor hen uit gingen. De allerbeste musici uit het Tzahal Orkest mogen een Europese tournee maken om op te treden voor hun vrienden in Nederland, België, Duitsland, Italië, noem maar op! En dit speciaal samengestelde ensemble krijgt het voor elkaar om de sfeer en temperatuur in de zaal tot een hoogtepunt te laten stijgen! Feestje gegarandeerd dus, met de army-band Tzahal!
Samenvattend:
Maandag 1 februari: Drachten
Woensdag 3 februari: Amersfoort
Donderdag 4 februari: Dordrecht
Alle concerten beginnen om half 8.
Kaarten
Mis dit dus niet, en reserveer alvast je kaarten! Tien euro per persoon. Kaartje is inclusief consumptie tijdens de pauze. Telefonisch: 033-2458824, of e-mail tzahal@christenenvoorisrael.nlDit e-mail adres is beschermd door spambots, u heeft Javascript nodig om dit onderdeel te kunnen bekijken (vergeet je postadres niet te vermelden!). De kaarten worden vanaf januari toegestuurd.
Je kunt ook online je kaarten bestellen (klik dan op 'Christenen voor Israel'
anzi
Israelity Blog
The reality of daily life in Israel
To start the week of shooting, drilling and soldiering in good spirits
The army is a picnic
January 20, 2010 - 9:46 AM by David
There’s nothing like a picnic outside an army base to rekindle any lost sparks of Zionism.
I’d have to say that the scene last week outside the Ketziot base was an example of something that’s uniquely Israeli – I can’t imagine it happening in any other country.
Our daughter’s in the early stages of six-months of basic training at the base, which is deep in the Negev, south of Beersheba, only a handful of kilometers from the Egyptian border.
Given the chance of spending a restful Shabbat at home or driving two and a half hours each way to spend a couple hours with her during ‘free time’ on her Shabbat on the base, we chose the only possible option.
So loading up the back of the car with a cooler filled with lunchtime delicacies, we headed south. Once you get past Beersheba, there’s not much else – it gets more and more desolate and desert-ed.
Even though I had spent three different reserve duties at Ketziot, where there is also a prison housing Palestinian detainees, I wondered a few times if we were on the right road. But sure enough, the turnoff for Ketziot eventually showed up, amid ‘camel crossing’ signs and the ocassional lone tree.
We drove down the narrow road and turned into the parking lot, only to find… a party! The lot was filled with dozens of cars, and the a neatly designed picnic area – complete with wooden, covered benches and tables, and a large swath of artificial grass – was packed with families and their soldier children.
Some families seem have brought their entire kitchen with them – with portable coffee makers the item of choice for many. Parents were moving around from group to group, handing out cookies, and soldiers were waving their friends/comrades over to introduce them to their parents.
It was like visiting day at college, except the students all had rifles slung over the shoulders and had great tans. After the allotted time, the families started packing up for the long ride home, and our children walked back through the gates of the base to get some rest in their tents until Shabbat went out – but not before handing their parents plastic bags full of laundry.
Hopefully, the visit had recharged them sufficiently to start the week of shooting, drilling and soldiering in good spirits. Only six more days, and they can sleep in their own beds for a couple nights.
anzi
Niet vergeten, woensdag memorial day
2 comments
David-Joe on Fri, Jan 22nd 2010 5:33 AM
I agree – only in Israel :-]
ilana walsh on Sun, Jan 24th 2010 3:25 PM
We once visited one of my sons when he was manning a roadside checkpoint on the way into Gaza. As he stopped vehicles we sat inside the sentry box, doling out the cola, fruit and chocolates to him and his mate who was on the roof of the box with a rifle. So next time you see a picture of a tough Israeli soldier on duty somewhere, you should know that his mother may not be far away with the goodies.
Another time we went to visit him when he spent a week in a tent with three others on the Green Line border near Maccabim-Reut. Our gifts of food were met with apathy as they pointed to the pile of boxes of fruit and other edibles donated by the locals. They said it was more than they could eat and practically asked US to take from THEM.
anzi
Vraag van de dag
NRC heute
Het Nederlandse kabinet wist al tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog dat prins Bernhard lid was geweest van de SS. De Schutzstaffel was een paramilitaire organisatie binnen de NSDAP. Waarom werd de SS opgericht?
3% Om concentratiekampen te bewaken
9% Om nazi-jongeren op te voeden
30% Als elite-eenheid achter vijandelijke linies
57% Als lijfwacht voor Hitler
anzi
Israel en Duitsland weer verenigd
Lied van de Hitlerjugend
'Ein junges Volk steht auf, zum Sturmbereit,
Reißt die Fahnen höher, Kameraden!
Wir fühlen nahe unsere Zeit,
Die Zeit der jungen Soldaten!
Vor uns marschieren mit sturmzerfetzten Fahnen
die toten Helden der jungen Nation,
und über uns die Heldenahnen!
Deutschland, Vaterland, wir kommen schon!
anzi
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