Hillel Fendel
The B’tselem civil rights organization has become an anti-Zionist tool for the destruction of Israel, charges Yesha Council head Danny Dayan. It has timed its latest anti-Israel report’s appearance to coincide with Netanyahu’s visit to Obama. The media in Israel has had the report for several days, but largely played along and acceded to B’tselem’s request not to publicize it until Tuesday, when Netanyahu and Obama meet. The report has some good news for supporters of the Jewish settlement enterprise, such as the fact that the growth of the Jewish population in Judea and Samaria (Yesha) was nearly three times higher than growth in all of Israel (5.1% to 1.8%). In addition, Yesha’s population has tripled since the beginning of the Oslo process in 1993.
However, there are some other stats in the report that are meant to be very damning for the Yesha population. For instance, B’tselem declares that 21% of the built-up areas within the Jewish towns are private Arab property. This is as if to say that every fifth Jewish home in Yesha is built on private property.
Danny Dayan says this is a distortion of the truth. “Not one Arab has been deprived of his land to build Jewish homes in Judea and Samaria,” he told Arutz-7’s Shimon Cohen. “Unlike in previous settlement enterprises, such as the kibbutzim of several decades ago, when there was no other choice… Since 1974, not one piece of privately-owned Arab land has been confiscated – and those that were, were totally compensated for, either in money or land. And the properties that were thus confiscated and compensated add up to much less than 21% - so that no matter how you slice it, this number is a brazen lie of the kind one can expect B’tselem to disseminate.”
Dayan had even stronger criticism of B’tselem for their purposeful publication of the report precisely as Netanyahu is to meet with Obama. “This is an act of an organization that is hostile to the State of Israel – and B’tselem has become exactly that. It is playing a central role in the campaign to divest Israel of its defensive means… Timing the report in this manner is an act that borders on treason.”
“B’tselem was the organization that was most quoted in the Goldstone Report,” said Dayan, who then delivered his sharpest blow: “It has become an anti-Zionist organization at the forefront of the effort to liquidate the State of Israel.”
“The media, as well,” he said, “is collaborating in this effort by agreeing not to publicize the findings until Tuesday, in accordance with B’tselem’s request. If anything, the very fact that B’tselem is making such a transparent move to influence political events should be more of a news item than all the nonsense written in the report.”
The B’tselem report to be published tomorrow also says that Israel’s government offers various incentives and benefits to people who live in Yesha. “This is an absolute lie,” Dayan said. “Other areas have such benefits, but here we pay high property taxes, as well as community taxes in many areas. The government promised the Americans that there would be no benefits, and unfortunately that is the case.”
“A few months ago,” Dayan continued, “there was a lot of noise about the classification of some Yesha communities as high-priority areas. We received much flak about the report, but in the end, it was not even implemented – such that we lost out on both ends.”
He noted that the original founders of B'tselem, "[ex-MK] Dedi Tzucker and [MK] Chaim Oron, are Zionists. But it has now been taken over by anti-Zionists who want to flood Israel with Arabs and turn Israel into something different than what it is. Their concern for human rights is just an excuse in their drive to weaken Israel."
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