Israel builds new W. Bank settlements

Israel started preparations to build new settlements in the West Bank, fulfilling the prediction of many analysts who warned that the Jewish state was dismantling old settlements to create new ones that cut deep into the area, preserving its control over the entire West bank, including areas where it removed settlers in previousl unilateral moves.

With its construction of Maskiot, Israel is breaking a promise to Washington while it tightens its grip over a stretch of desert it wants to keep, as part of recent plan drawn up by the new PM to set the Jewish states’ final borders.

A recent poll carried out by the GeoCartographia Research Institute in Israel showed that 44% of the Jewish settlers in the West Bank are willing to leave the settlements voluntarily in return of financial compensation.

The poll findings come in sharp contrast to a similar poll conducted last year shortly before the unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and four settlements in the West Bank, which showed only 25% of the settlers in the West Bank willing to evacuate peacefully.

64% of the secular settlers, 47% of the religious settlers and 23% of national religious settlers are ready to voluntarily leave the settlements, the poll showed.

News of new Jewish settlements come as Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert pushes for a full U.S. support for future plans to occupy parts of the West Bank as part of a plan to draw the final borders of Israel with or without Palestinian’s approval.

Maskiot construction amounts to a new attempt by the Jewish state to push its border deeper into the West Bank, said watchdog group Peace Now.

"It's about grabbing land," said Yariv Oppenheimer of Peace Now.

Otniel Schneller, an Olmert adviser, confirmed Israel’s preparations for new West Bank settlements, arguing that the Jewish state needs to keep the Jordan Valley, where Maskiot lies, as a security barrier against attacks by armed groups based in Iraq, Iran and elsewhere.

Israel plans to relocate some 70,000 West Bank settlers to the western side of the Separation Barrier, a move seen as aimed at ensuring a Jewish majority in lands it controls.

Jewish settlers expected to inhabit Maskiot settlements say they receive money from right-leaning Jewish donors and the Israeli government.
Stewart Tuttle, the U.S. Embassy spokesman in Tel Aviv, was asked about whether Israel’s new settlement plans violate U.S. policy.

He replied:

"As a general principle, the U.S. government is opposed to settlement expansion," Tuttle said.

"Ceasing settlement expansion is one of Israel's commitments under the road map."

Israeli bulldozers have already cleared the top of a hill at Maskiot and workers started laying foundations for four houses, according to media reports.

The construction of Maskiot was decided before March elections, Israel's Defense Ministry confirmed.

Dr. Rina Degani, an expert in the field of calculating the economic potential of products, and the Head of The GeoCartographia Research Institute, stated earlier that half a million settlers, including 55,000 families, live in West Bank settlements.

The number Degani gave excludes those living in settlement outposts in the Old City of Jerusalem, the properties controlled by West Bank settlers worth 19 billion US Dollars.

The cost of the Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's Convergence Plan, aimed at evacuating 60.000 settlers living in the West Bank, is approximately 10 billion U.S dollars.

His plan doesn’t imply evacuating all settlements from the occupied West Bank.

Israel’s Newspaper, Maariv, has stated that United States still refuses to finance any part of the convergence plan.

According to Israeli sources, American officials are still in talks with their administration in Washington over supporting the plan.

Olmert said that he was informed by those officials that U.S. cannot recognize border drawn unilaterally by Israel.

The officials preferred identifying the withdrawal line as the current “Green Line” with some modifications.

The Green Line should be permanent and it should not conflict with the “letter of assurances” which the U.S. President George W, Bush handed to the then-Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon in 2004, which included guarantees by the Bush administration to recognize settlement blocs in the West Bank and consider them part of the Jewish State.