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Why Israel Allowed the Settlement Freeze to Expire

(JTA) Uriel Heilman - In media accounts, Israel's decision not to extend its self-imposed 10-month freeze on settlement building has been portrayed as a slap in the face to the Obama administration and creating more stumbling blocks to a final peace accord. But what is perceived around the world as Israeli stubbornness is seen much differently in Israel. In Jerusalem, it is the Palestinians who are seen as stubborn for sticking to their insistence that settlement building be halted before coming to the negotiating table. Never before had such a precondition been imposed on negotiations; in the past, Israelis and Palestinians talked while both continued to build in their respective West Bank communities. Having offered the freeze unilaterally 10 months ago to coax the Palestinians back to the negotiating table and satisfy U.S. demands for an Israeli good-will gesture, the Israeli government sees itself as the accommodating party whose gesture was never reciprocated. Perhaps most important, however, the freeze was seen by many Israelis as unfair. The vast majority of the 300,000 Jews who live in the West Bank are families living in bedroom communities within easy commuting distance of Jerusalem or metropolitan Tel Aviv. These Israelis saw themselves as unfairly penalized: Why were they barred from expanding their homes when their Palestinian neighbors were not?
2010-09-29 09:07:59
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