Why the settlements are important.

Jewish Current Issues

Why the settlements are important. Excerpts from two characteristically incisive comments by military and intelligence analyst J. E. Dyer at Jonathan Tobin’s contentions post yesterday: The most consistent position from Israeli leaders . . . is that the West Bank is a holistic national defense issue, of which the settlements are an integral element. No aspect of the settlements is divorced from the question of defensible borders for Israel . . .

Without occupying the summits that look down on Israel’s eastern border, Israel can’t defend her narrow territory against attack from the East. That is the defensible borders issue with the West Bank, and was demonstrated clearly in the ‘67 war. The significance of holding these summits has only increased with time, and the expanded range of man-portable missile systems. . . .

One thing is certain. Everyone in the Middle East understands the military/defensive value of the Israeli settlements in the West Bank. They fully understand there that the beef the Palestinians have with the settlements is precisely that the settlements deny the Palestinians access to the summits that look down on Jerusalem, and the rest of Israel’s eastern border.

If Israel did, in fact, abandon that territory in terms of occupation and military defense, there is no natural or political barrier at the perimeter of the West Bank that would prevent outside support to the Palestinians there from quickly turning the threat to Israel — within 2-3 weeks — into the same level of threat posed to Israel from Lebanon, and from the other side of the Golan Heights.

There is no reason whatsoever to imagine that Jordan would (or even could) do anything to prevent the development of such a threat. If Israel did not address it promptly by reoccupying the West Bank, it could build very quickly after that into a full-blown military threat.

To recap: (1) the major settlements are on the high ground overlooking pre-1967 Israel, and whoever holds that high ground holds the military assets necessary either to defend or attack Israel; (2) Israeli settlement activity for the last five years has been largely limited to growth within the geographical limits of those settlement blocs, which will be kept by Israel in any conceivable peace agreement; and (3) the entire West Bank is disputed territory, as to which Israel has historical and religious connections, legal claims arising out of the documents that established the British mandate, and the military necessity to insure it cannot become the staging area for the kind of attack that nearly destroyed Israel in 1967.

Israel’s connections, claims and necessities can be negotiated by Israel in return for a Palestinian and Arab commitment to recognize Israel within defensible borders -- but to suggest that the current major settlements are “obstacles to peace,” or that stopping settlement activity within them would lead to peace, is to suggest that an Israel with defensible borders is an obstacle. There will be no peace (even if a “peace agreement” were signed) if Israel does not have defensible borders, and the freedom to live within them. In fact, a “peace agreement” without such borders or freedom would lead to a new war.

Which is why settlement activity will continue in the same fashion it has for the last five years.

Posted by Rick Richman | Permalink