Thursday, March 26, 2009

Life Goes On

BBC's Tim Franks, back from a vacation, has a report on my neighboring community to the north, a mile away, Eli.



In New support for West Bank outpost, he claims "an unauthorised settlement in the West Bank, illegal even under Israeli law, appears to be benefiting from state funding".

The crime?

A road is being built from the established settlement of Eli, near [near? not really] the Palestinian city of Nablus, leading east to the illegal outpost at Hayovel...under Israeli law, those newer, smaller settlements - known as outposts - which have not received authorisation from the government are deemed, by the Israeli government, to be illegal.


The details:

Drive up the twisting, landscaped roads of Eli, a mid-sized settlement in the heart of the West Bank, and you come across a scene of intense construction activity...outside observers are not welcome. The BBC was asked, twice, to leave the settlement, when we drew too close to the site of the road.

...Abdel Nasser...shows on a map, the new road to the outpost carves straight through land which he says is owned by his village, Qaryut...an official from Israel's Civil Administration said that the matter was now in the hands of "inspectors".

...All this has been happening under a government which is publically committed to the eventual establishment of a Palestinian state, in the West Bank.

The future Israeli government, which is likely to come into office next week, will be led by a man, Binyamin Netanyahu, who sees no such need...the momentum on the ground appears to be swinging the other way.


Well, maybe authorisation is just around the corner, maybe Abdel Nasser doesn't own the land and maybe the courts will agree.

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