Sixty-Thousand Americans & "Palestinian Hamlets"

The Jewish Press alerted me to this exchange and I thought to bring it to your attention in full.  The questioner is Said Erikat

Here is the video starting around 20:18.

QUESTION: -- Palestinian-Israeli issue? There was a study issued by Oxford University and published in Haaretz yesterday that there are 60,000 American Jewish settlers in the West Bank. Do you have any comment on that?

MR TONER: Sixty thousand?

QUESTION: Sixty thousand American Jewish settlers in the West Bank.

MR TONER: I don’t. I’m not aware of the study.

QUESTION: I know because you guys – your position is --

MR TONER: I just haven’t seen the study, frankly, so I don’t --

QUESTION: -- you oppose the settlements, you oppose – you consider them to be illegal and so on. But there you go – you have 60,000 Americans. Do you have any leverage with these American citizens?

MR TONER: Look, I mean, in terms of leverage – I mean, we through our embassy offer support for American citizens throughout the world. But what – we’re very clear on our policy on this issue, and I don’t know that we need to be any clearer.

QUESTION: Many elements among these settlers are extremists, they carry guns, they enforce their own sort of rules and regulations on roads and hamlets and so on – Palestinian hamlets. Do you have any kind of program, perhaps, to rehabilitate these settlers, bring them back somehow, as as opposed to the settlements?

MR TONER: No, I mean – and the other thing is we’ve also spoken about the uptick in violence, in extremist violence in Israel. And in fact, the government and the prime minister have also spoken about some of the recent attacks that we view as abhorrent. And we call on, frankly, all sides to stop this kind of violence.

In terms of programs, I’m not aware of what you’re – specific programs aimed at Israeli American settlers, no.

QUESTION: Since I – my last question on this issue.

MR TONER: Yeah, sure.

QUESTION: Should the United States or would the United States have some sort of a program – an incentive program – to sort of encourage settlers to perhaps dismantle these settlements?

MR TONER: I mean, that’s really a question for the Israeli Government to look at. I mean, we’ve been very clear on how we feel about settlements.

QUESTION: Not really because they maintain their U.S. citizenship.

MR TONER: Well, we believe that settlements hinder getting any kind of talks back up and running and peace process going. We want to see positive actions on all sides.

Of course, the question of Arab residents who engage in terror and are American citiznes never gets raised.

Love the "Palestinian hamlets".

I'd call them "settlements".

But note that he feels he must dominate the semantic discourse and people argue with me about my term "revenants".  If we use it consistently, there'll be no problem.

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