President Obama delivers a speech announcing a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point Tuesday night (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) |
JERUSALEM – The Obama administration is pressuring Israel to enlarge a freeze on Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria, a top Israeli official told Middle East diplomats in a closed briefing.
Israel's deputy prime minister, Dan Meridor, told the diplomats, however, that the Obama administration has agreed to respect a previous commitment reached under President Bush that Israel would not need to withdraw from the entire 1967 borders, meaning all of eastern Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank.
The contents of Meridor's meeting with the diplomats was leaked to WND.
Meridor said the Obama administration largely accepted that any final Palestinian state will not need to include three main settlement blocs – Ariel, Gush Etzion and Maale Adumim. Bush previously issued an official letter in 2004 stating Israel cannot be expected to withdraw from all of Judea and Samaria and that the Jewish state would retain major settlement blocs there.
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Meridor told the diplomats the Obama administration is pressuring Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to expand a 10-month freeze on Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria announced last week.
Netanyahu said Israel would not stop construction in eastern Jerusalem and would still allow the building of Judea and Samaria synagogues, kindergartens and necessary municipal structures. Meridor told the diplomats Obama wants the 10-month freeze to include all structures and to be expanded to eastern Jerusalem.
Describing the decision as a "painful step," Netanyahu announced he was "taking the issue out of broad national security considerations with the goal of renewing negotiations to achieve peace with our neighbors, the Palestinians."
The Palestinian Authority, however, immediately rejected the freeze and demanded more.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a top aide to PA President Mahmoud Abbas, told reporters the Palestinians "reject returning to peace talks without the complete cessation of settlement activities in the West Bank and Jerusalem."
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat urged the U.S. to pressure Israel to freeze all construction activity completely in both Jerusalem and the West Bank.
Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan stated Netanyahu's offer "proves once again that Israel is interested not in peace, but in creating facts on the ground" and stated that "overlooking ongoing construction in Jerusalem will put the peace process in jeopardy."
Never in the history of regional talks here did restarting Israeli-Palestinian negotiations depend on any freeze of Jewish construction. The issue largely began after President Obama demanded Jewish construction be halted in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, leading to a hardening of the PA's bargaining position.
Judea and Samaria border major Israeli cities and are within rocket-firing range of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Israel's international airport.
Military strategists long have estimated Israel must maintain Judea and Samaria to defend itself from any ground invasion. Terrorist groups have warned if Israel withdraws, they will launch rockets from the West Bank into Israeli cities.
Many villages in Judea and Samaria, which Israelis commonly refer to as the "biblical heartland," are mentioned throughout the Torah:
The book of Genesis says Abraham entered Israel at Shechem (Nablus) and received God's promise of land for his offspring. He later was buried in Hebron.
The nearby town of Beit El, anciently called Bethel, meaning "house of God," is where Scripture says the patriarch Jacob slept on a stone pillow and dreamed of angels ascending and descending a stairway to heaven. In the dream, God spoke directly to Jacob and reaffirmed the promise of territory.
And in Exodus, the tabernacle rested in Shiloh, believed to be the first area the ancient Israelites settled after fleeing Egypt.