The Last Exile

Binyamin Netanyahu is a hard political figure for North Americans to view and understand in an Israeli context. He is eloquent and a masterful speaker in English and he knows all the right things to say which pulls at the Diaspora heart strings in North America. As such, its always a surprise to North Americans to learn just how little well regarded he is in Israel. I try to tell people but I get poop-poohed on a regular basis. My words mean little when measured against their perceptions from viewing Netanyahu on the regular Anglo television talk circuits.

Watching Bibi Netanyahu after the Israeli elections last winter I came away with the distinct impression that Bibi was stuck trying to correct his mistakes made during his last attempt at running the country rather than building on the new realities. While I still believe he is giving far too much weight to the issues which brought down his former government but I may seriously have to reconsider that I have misjudged Bibi’s learning curve.

Reading the daily news reports of the anti-settlement freeze I was kept asking myself; how could Netanyahu not know this would be the response to his self-imposed freeze on construction and what does he gain by it?

One of the major fall-outs from the Sharon Disengagements from the Gaza Strip, excluding the obvious escalation of rocket attacks, showed the Israeli public the very real and painful consequences to Israeli citizens when the government expels them. If anything this ensures that any future withdrawals will be met with great resistance. The continued plight of the Gush Katif refugees illustrates a daily painful lesson. No one would willingly chose to take on that mantle without a fight for their lives.

Reading the reports in the last few days I was suddenly struck the nagging idea that perhaps Netanyahu deliberately made the building freeze far more restrictive and far-ranging than any Israeli administration had before in order to provoke the current Israeli response. Of course, if the response was a little slow from the Israeli street Bibi knew he could count on the character of Ehud Barak who wouldn’t fail him. Barak and his far left politics are unable to resist an opportunity to lash out against Israeli settlers and thereby would guarantee a response from the Israeli street.

There is no doubt in my mind that the whole building freeze notion was born through the misguided and naive efforts of Obama Administration and pressure was brought to bear against Netanyahu. No doubt he protested that a building freeze would endanger his coalition and create civil strife on the Israeli street. The bubble the Obama Administration operates in probably discounted Netanyahu’s warnings as the ravings of a far-right policy hawk and not a realistic evaluation of the Israeli sentiment.

This morning I came across this update at Ynet News update in which Likud MK Danny Danon makes a rather remarkable statement about an encounter with Bibi which gives weight to my suspicious. Ynet News

Netanyahu said to the members of Knesset, “We are a in a continual struggle over the map of Israel.” He also said that he is impressed by the determination of some faction members to continue advocating for settlement in the West Bank. “You have to go out and protest against me. Then we’ll finish it early,” said Netanyahu to the MKs. (Attila Somfalvi)

Keep in mind this rather interesting statement Netanyahu made last Sunday. Ynet News

“Even if Abu Mazen (PA President Mahmoud Abbas) will come in another eight months with the message ‘Peace Now,’ we will start building as before. The cabinet’s decision has a deadline,” said Netanyahu in the weekly cabinet meeting.

This still leaves the question of what Bibi gains and I sincerely doubt he is gunning for the ‘good-will’ of the Obama administration. He is far too pragmatic a man and too seasoned an Israeli politician to have made a bargain without getting something solid in return. If my suspicious are correct than whatever Bibi bargained for should come to come to light within the next ten months.

The 10 month settlement freeze instituted by Israeli government hasn’t been smooth sailing. Not only has the Palestinian leadership not been induced to enter into negotiations with the the Israelis but Israeli opposition to the freeze continues to build. This was simply the protests at yesterday’s events and reports of opposition to surface today. Ynet News:

Residents of the West Bank settlement Sha’arei Tikva are blocking entry to Civil Administration inspectors to the settlement. The inspectors arrived to distribute building freeze orders in accordance with the cabinet’s decision to impose a temporary moratorium on settlement building in the West Bank.

Ynet News:

Residents of the West Bank settlement of Kedumim are blocking the entrance to the community after spotting Civil Administration building inspectors approaching the area. The inspectors arrived to distribute construction freeze orders in accordance with a cabinet decision on the matter.

And even after the Yassim managed to clear the road into the Kedumim settlement; the Inspectors are not free from civilian disobedience. While the ‘building order freeze’ in not just on new construction efforts like the construction of a new home or an addition to a current home but also affects common things like structure repairs to a building or paving of a driveway. The widespread opposition to the freeze has no doubt prompted this statement from Netanyahu. Ynet News

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called upon government ministers, members of Knesset, and settlement leaders to obey the decisions of the cabinet and to honor the West Bank settlement building freeze.
 
However, Netanyahu emphasized that building in the settlements will resume again: “Even if Abu Mazen (PA President Mahmoud Abbas) will come in another eight months with the message ‘Peace Now,’ we will start building as before. The cabinet’s decision has a deadline,” said Netanyahu in the weekly cabinet meeting

And as if the Gush Katif refugees had not paid a high enough price after the disastrous disengagement from the Gaza Strip; it appears the Netanyahu policy of a settlement freeze requires another pound of flesh from the Gush Katif refugees. Arutz Sheva:

(IsraelNN.com) The government’s construction freeze has frozen the construction of permanent homes for some 30 families thrown out of Netzarim and other Gush Katif towns in 2005. The families have written a plea to Prime Minister Netanyahu, asking him to allow them to complete the long and difficult process of rehabilitation that they have undergone in the last 4.5 years.
Arik Yefet, chairman of the group, wrote, “I turn to you in the name of some 30 families that were uprooted from Netzarim and other Gush Katif towns in the Disengagement. We have been living in the temporary site in the [Samaria] city of Ariel, in old caravans [mobile homes without wheels] and large containers.

“We were astonished to hear of the diplomatic-security mini-Cabinet’s decision” – an allusion to the fact that the decision was never ratified by the full Cabinet – “to decree a blanket and immediate construction freeze on the entire settlement enterprise in Judea and Samaria. This decision has immediate ramifications on all of Judea and Samaria, and particularly on those who were thrown out of Gaza. We have invested our money – close to 20 million shekels in total – on various aspects of the project, including buying the plots, architectural and engineering planning, fees and levies, a project manager, and more.”

Not only with the freeze cost the Gush Katif refugees in the Ariel settlement money it also continues to play havoc with their lives as they will be forced to live another year in temporary housing before construction actually takes place. In the end, will there even be enough money for them to actually build if they have to continue to pay for temporary housing? The most astonishing fact of the self-induced settlement freeze of the Netanyahu government is that in the end – the Israelis gain nothing by taking such unilateral actions.