Will we spend decades regretting the day when the chance for sovereignty was at hand – and we said no? - by R. Uri Pilichowski

Meanwhile Palestinians laughed at the settlers, with one PA official saying, “The settlers’ opposition to the plan is doing our work for us.”

R. Uri Pilichowski..
TOI Blogs..
16 August '20..

As a settler in Judea and Samaria, I’m supposed to tow the line that any plan that mentions a Palestinian State is to be rejected. A Palestinian State was called for in President Trump’s “Peace to Prosperity” plan and settlers were put in a quandary. The plan called for Israel extending sovereignty to 30% of Judea and Samaria yet the plan also called for a Palestinian state.

A few miles from my house, well within smelling distance, construction has begun on a waste-to-energy incinerator. These incinerators are notorious for their bad smells, environmental destruction, and air pollution. Israel’s new Environmental Protection Minister, Gila Gamliel, has halted construction on three of these plants, but has allowed the one near our town to continue. The difference between the three that she stopped and the one near our town is the green line. The three that were stopped are within Israel’s green line, and ours is over it, in Judea and Samaria (The West Bank). Since Israeli sovereignty hasn’t been extended to our area, the air polluting incinerator is going forward. It will severely affect our quality of life. This is just one of many examples of how Israelis who reside in Judea and Samaria, settlers, live different lives than Israelis within the green line.

For fifty two years, the sovereignty movement, led by Yehudit Katsover and Nadia Matar, advocated for extending Israeli sovereignty to Judea and Samaria. Like many settlers, with images of uprooted settlements like Yamit, Gush Katif and Homesh engraved in our hearts and minds, I thought extending Israeli sovereignty to Judea and Samaria was a dream. I was satisfied with settlements being allowed to grow.

When President Trump announced his plan, and included in it the promise of American support for extending Israeli sovereignty to Judea and Samaria, I was shocked. Like many skeptics, I read the plan looking for the catch. When it called for a Palestinian state I was initially disappointed but when I read the conditions for American support for the plan, I quickly came to two realizations. First, there was no way the Palestinians could or would meet these requirements, and second, any reasonable reading of the plan should recognize the dream come true of sovereignty and the impossibility of a Palestinian state coming to fruition.

Settler leaders like Efrat Mayor Oded Revivi recognized the benefits of the plan immediately, writing, “It is now our responsibility to embrace the Trump program – and apply Israeli law according to its framework throughout Judea and Samaria.”

Unfortunately other settler leaders objected and publicly criticized the plan. They lobbied Prime Minister Netanyahu to reject the plan, even at the cost of sovereignty. Objections ranged from the plan not calling for sovereignty on all of Judea and Samaria to a comprehensive map not having been released, unfounded worries about certain settlements being left alone in danger, and chief among them, the plan’s call for a Palestinian state.

(Continue to Full Post)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work.