[BRIEF NOTE] Itchy and Scratchy in the Levant
Via CBC.
Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, in his first interview since taking power last month, will tell the Israeli public he intends to hold on to Israel's three major settlement blocs as well as West Bank communities on the border with Jordan, the interviewer told Army Radio on Tuesday.
This would be the first time that Olmert went into detail on Israel's final borders as he sees them, and position his Kadima Party more clearly ahead of March 28 elections. The interview with Olmert was taped Tuesday morning and is to be broadcast Tuesday night. Asked by Army Radio what the highlights of the interview were, reporter Nissim Mishal said it was the first time that Olmert went into detail on what Israel would retain.
Pressed on whether Olmert specified whether he intended to hold on to the three settlement blocs and the Jordan Valley settlements, Mishal replied, "Yes, yes. This is the first time that a sitting prime minister . . . has mentioned the communities that you mentioned - the Jordan Valley, Ariel, Gush Etzion, Maaleh Adumim."
Such frontiers would leave a Palestinian entity in the West Bank without any land frontiers with a country apart from Israel, and without very many territorial resources with which to support and to control the the densely Palestinian-populated urban and periurban areas that will make up a non-Israeli West Bank entity. The similarity of this landlocked and isolated situation to that of South Africa's bantustans is, of course, eminently debatable. More's the pity that it has to be debatable.
Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, in his first interview since taking power last month, will tell the Israeli public he intends to hold on to Israel's three major settlement blocs as well as West Bank communities on the border with Jordan, the interviewer told Army Radio on Tuesday.
This would be the first time that Olmert went into detail on Israel's final borders as he sees them, and position his Kadima Party more clearly ahead of March 28 elections. The interview with Olmert was taped Tuesday morning and is to be broadcast Tuesday night. Asked by Army Radio what the highlights of the interview were, reporter Nissim Mishal said it was the first time that Olmert went into detail on what Israel would retain.
Pressed on whether Olmert specified whether he intended to hold on to the three settlement blocs and the Jordan Valley settlements, Mishal replied, "Yes, yes. This is the first time that a sitting prime minister . . . has mentioned the communities that you mentioned - the Jordan Valley, Ariel, Gush Etzion, Maaleh Adumim."
Such frontiers would leave a Palestinian entity in the West Bank without any land frontiers with a country apart from Israel, and without very many territorial resources with which to support and to control the the densely Palestinian-populated urban and periurban areas that will make up a non-Israeli West Bank entity. The similarity of this landlocked and isolated situation to that of South Africa's bantustans is, of course, eminently debatable. More's the pity that it has to be debatable.