Why it is still open season on ‘obstacles to peace’ - by Jonathan S. Tobin

If you think “settlers” have it coming, then like a new HBO film, you’re missing the point about why Oslo failed.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
JNS.org..
17 September '18..

One more Jewish life was just added to the list of those killed during the century-old conflict between Jews and Arabs. On Sunday, a Palestinian terrorist fatally stabbed to death Ari Fuld, a 45-year-old American immigrant to Israel and a married father of four, in addition to an articulate advocate for the Jewish state. But for some people, the only relevant fact about him is that he was a resident of Efrat, a Jerusalem suburb that lies over the so-called green line in the West Bank.

Efrat is part of the Etzion bloc that was originally settled by Jews before 1948. But in the eyes of the world, that still makes it a settlement and Fuld a “settler.”

Like the hundreds of thousands of other Jews who live in the West Bank and Jerusalem, Fuld was reviled as an obstacle to peace. That’s why the reaction to attacks on those who fall into this category is so often one of heartless indifference—if not gloating about people who had it coming—on social media and elsewhere. Not only Palestinians who consider all violence against Jews justified acts of “resistance” hold this attitude. Across the world and even among many Jews, “settler” is an epithet more than a description. Since the Oslo Accords were signed 25 years ago, settlements and settlers have become the all-purpose scapegoat for the lack of peace and undeserving of sympathy even when slain by terrorists.

While most Israelis have embraced a hard-headed realism about diplomacy forced upon them by 25 years of tragedy, myths about the Israeli right and about settlers killing prospects for peace continue to get an airing in the media and popular culture. The latest example of this trend is a new documentary being shown on HBO called “Oslo Diaries” that helps explain the antipathy for settlers.

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