Plan moves 'Jewish West Bank' to desert

Relocation in works for displaced residents of Israeli withdrawal

By Aaron Klein



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© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com

JERUSALEM – With acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announcing his administration will seek to withdraw from most of the West Bank following elections here later this month, WND has learned a plan is in the works to relocate the tens of thousands of displaced Jewish residents in the Israeli Negev desert.

"We are talking about a very large population that would be removed from the West Bank," a top member of Olmert's Kadima party told WND. "The plan is to push for them to settle in the Negev, which is able to accommodate the big numbers and which is already prepared to accept a large influx of new residents."

Olmert officially announced last month Israel will withdraw unilaterally from most of the West Bank and make other moves aimed at changing the Jewish state's borders.


"[Israel] will separate from most of the Palestinian population that lives in the West Bank, and that will obligate us to separate as well from territories where the state of Israel currently is," Olmert told reporters.

Olmert said under his West Bank withdrawal plan, which he detailed this week in an interview with Israel's leading newspaper Yediot Aharonot, the Jewish state will maintain select security zones and some of the area's large West Bank Jewish communities, alluding to evacuating major West Bank towns that fall outside Israel's security fence.

"We will gather ourselves into the main settlement blocs and preserve united Jerusalem. ... Ma'aleh Adumim, Gush Etzion and Ariel will be part of the state of Israel," he said.

About 200,000 Jews live in the West Bank.

The security fence, still under construction in certain areas, cordons off nearly 95 percent of the territory from Israel's pre-1967 borders. More than half the West Bank's Jewish residents reside on the side of the fence closest to Israel. About 80,000 more Jews live on the other side of the barrier.

In an interview last weekend, top Kadima member and former Shin Bet Security Services Director Avi Dichter said immediately after Israeli elections, scheduled for March 28, Olmert's administration will draft a plan to evacuate specific West Bank Jewish communities, naming several major settlement blocs he said will be dismantled.

But the question of what to do with the tens of thousands of West Bank Jewish residents who would be displaced as a result of any large-scale withdrawal has yet to be addressed.

Seven months after Israel's evacuation of 8,500 residents from Jewish communities in the Gaza Strip, many of the former Gaza residents still are living in temporary housing, including hotels and dormitories, and have not received full compensation payments promised by the government. A report by Israel's state comptroller released earlier this week blasted the Israeli government for being "inexcusably unprepared" in dealing with the Gaza evacuees' relocation programs.

A top Kadima official told WND Olmert's plan is to push for any displaced Jewish residents to either move to other West Bank communities that will remain intact or to settle in the Israeli Negev desert.

The Negev stretches from Eilat at the south of the country through Ber Sheva in the north. It encompasses about 66 percent of the land of Israel, but only houses about 10 percent of its population.

"The Negev is seen as a very good alternative for those expected to be displaced," the official said. "The climate is warm and Israel has been searching for years for ways to bring in a large influx of people to the Negev."

Together with Jewish organizations, particularly the American-based Jewish National Fund, Israel has led teams in developing the Negev into fertile land and preparing new communities in the area. Several American real estate companies and private U.S. citizens have invested large sums in Negev construction efforts.

"The future of Israel is here in the [Negev]," biologist Avigad Vonshak, who heads a Negev research program at Ben Gurion University, told reporters. "Unless you believe we have to conquer back the West Bank and Lebanon, there's no other choice."


The Jewish National Fund's website outlines its plans to bring large numbers of people to the Negev:

"Grasp the economic, demographic and geographic realities of Israel, and you will understand the immediate need to develop the Negev. Over the next five years, our goal is to bring 250,000 new residents to the Negev," the Fund's website states.

Olmert has been using demographics to justify his plan to vacate the West Bank, which borders most of Israel's major cities. He claimed unless Israel soon separates from the Palestinians, Arabs will outnumber Jews and threaten the country's Jewish character.

But as WorldNetDaily reported, a new study presented to Congress this week by American researchers contends a West Bank withdrawal based on demography is groundless because Israel's Jews will more than double Arabs in 20 years. The study found Israel and the U.S. have been relying on allegedly exaggerated Palestinian Authority demographic information, which inflated the Palestinian population by over 50 percent.

Americans Bennet Zimmerman, Roberta Seid and Michael Wise put the current Palestinian-Arab population of the West Bank at 1.4 million and Gaza 1.1 million, for a total of 2.4 million, instead of the 3.8 million reported by the Palestinian Authority Central Bureau of Statistics.

They found faults in the methods used by the PA to determine its population, including counting the 230,000 Arab residents of Jerusalem twice and retroactively raising growth and birth rates while the rates actually have been declining.

Zimmerman's team has shown birthrates among Israeli Orthodox Jews are at their highest levels ever and that general Israeli Jewish fertility over the past five years has risen above top scenarios first considered by Israel's Bureau of Statistics. The study says Israel did not account for a likely continuation of Jewish immigration trends over the next 20 years, which reportedly result in a Jewish majority in Israel in 2025 of 63 percent.

"It is ironic that just as we now find Israel is in the best position ever with regard to population, Olmert announces a plan to run away and give up the West Bank, claiming Israel's Jewish character is threatened," said Zimmerman.

The West Bank is considered landlocked territory not officially recognized as part of any country. Israel calls the land "disputed," while the United Nations says the West Bank is "occupied" by Israel. The Jewish state maintains overall control of most of the area while the Palestinian Authority has jurisdiction in about 40 percent.

The territory remained under Jordanian rule from 1948 until Israel captured it in 1967 after Jordan's King Hussein ignored Israeli pleas for his country to stay out of the Six Day War. Most countries rejected Jordan's initial claim on the area, which it formally renounced in 1988.

The West Bank is near most of Israel's major cities, including Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Military strategists long have estimated Israel must maintain the West Bank to defend its borders from any ground invasion.

Terrorist groups have warned if Israel withdraws, they will launch rockets from the West Bank into Israeli cities.

Many villages in the West Bank, which Israelis commonly refer to as the "biblical heartland," are mentioned throughout the Torah.

The book of Genesis says Abraham entered Israel at Shechem (Nablus) and received God's promise of land for his offspring. He later was buried in Hebron.

The nearby town of Beit El, anciently called Bethel meaning "house of God," is where Scripture says the patriarch Jacob slept on a stone pillow and dreamed of angels ascending and descending a stairway to heaven. In that dream, God spoke directly to Jacob and reaffirmed the promise of territory.

And in Exodus, the holy tabernacle rested in Shiloh, believed to be the first area the ancient Israelites settled after fleeing Egypt.


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