How ‘experts’ got it wrong

Op-ed: Demographic threat hyped up, Israeli withdrawal from Judea and Samaria unnecessary

Moshe Dann
Israel Opinion/Ynet
14 December '10

Opponents of Israel's legal and historical rights to Judea and Samaria raise a powerful and persuasive argument: Israel faces a "demographic crisis;" the Arab population between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River will soon outnumber that of the Jews, and the nature of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state is in danger.

They argue, therefore, that Israel must withdraw from what was known, under Jordanian occupation, as the "West Bank," (to distinguish it from Jordan's "East Bank"), including "eastern Jerusalem," the Old City and Temple Mount, and create a second Arab Palestinian state (after Jordan); the Golan Heights, in this plan, would revert to Syria. This, they argue, would avoid charges of "occupation," "oppression," "racism," "apartheid," etc.; it does not relate to Palestinian Arabs who are Israeli citizens, or the "Nakba," (Catastrophe) in 1948, Israel's creation and what Palestinians consider "occupation."

The "demographic argument" was used to convince former PM Yitzhak Rabin to agree to the Oslo Accords, and was promoted by the dominant left-wing media, former PMs Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert, Israeli ministers and politicians, and PM Netanyahu. There's only one problem: it's a myth, part of a campaign to destroy the settlement movement; it has been thoroughly refuted by various studies, including Bar-Ilan University's The Million Person Gap and work undertaken by The Institute for Zionist Strategies,

(Read full "How ‘experts’ got it wrong")

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