The timing cannot be an accident.
The same day Israel courageously and controversially released 550 Palestinian political prisoners (though not, tellingly, Marwan Barghouti), the Israeli housing authority issued 1,000 new settler permits. All of the new settler tenders apply to areas around Jerusalem.
According to Israeli Housing and Construction Minister Ariel Atias, "The decision was reached last month after the Palestinians were accepted into UNESCO."
"Some countries won't be pleased with this, but they won't be surprised," he added.
Tragically, Atias is correct. Israel's continued policy of using settlements as both a bargaining chip and a flail is about as unpredictable as an M. Night Shyamalan twist. Whenever Israel wants something, settlements are there to be discussed. Not, mind you, a settlement freeze, but rather the dismantling of existing settlements. And whenever Israel feels threatened or spurned - and in this case, it feels spurned, UNESCO is hardly a threatening organization - the housing ministry approves new settlement permits.
You might ask why. Settlements cause nothing but trouble, it would seem. Israeli soldiers that could be defending the country's existing and much-complained-about borders must instead help settlers defend themselves, monitor supply lines, water resources, etc. Israel's allies wring their hands in distress, and occasionally malign an Israeli leader. Human rights groups condemn the activities, which is something of an embarrassment given historic Jewish commitment to the rights of man. The settlements cost Israel money, time, human and military resources, prestige, legitimacy, friends, trustworthiness. They are, at first glance, a strategic liability.
Until you look at the settlers themselves.
Israeli soldiers are bound, however loosely, by a code of conduct. Israel likes to claim that its soldiers are the most humane in the world, though at least one late Palestinian protester would beg to disagree if he still had a face. Israeli settlers are not. It speaks volumes about our media that Katyusha rockets with a dismal (or, objectively, happy) casualty count generate more attention that repeated and escalating settler attacks on mosques, homes, and individuals themselves.
And what better way to remind Palestinians, even as they welcome home their recently detained, of their place than to send a group of religious zealots into their midst, to do the work that really could backfire on the slick PR machine that is Israeli foreign policy?
The same day Israel courageously and controversially released 550 Palestinian political prisoners (though not, tellingly, Marwan Barghouti), the Israeli housing authority issued 1,000 new settler permits. All of the new settler tenders apply to areas around Jerusalem.
According to Israeli Housing and Construction Minister Ariel Atias, "The decision was reached last month after the Palestinians were accepted into UNESCO."
"Some countries won't be pleased with this, but they won't be surprised," he added.
Tragically, Atias is correct. Israel's continued policy of using settlements as both a bargaining chip and a flail is about as unpredictable as an M. Night Shyamalan twist. Whenever Israel wants something, settlements are there to be discussed. Not, mind you, a settlement freeze, but rather the dismantling of existing settlements. And whenever Israel feels threatened or spurned - and in this case, it feels spurned, UNESCO is hardly a threatening organization - the housing ministry approves new settlement permits.
You might ask why. Settlements cause nothing but trouble, it would seem. Israeli soldiers that could be defending the country's existing and much-complained-about borders must instead help settlers defend themselves, monitor supply lines, water resources, etc. Israel's allies wring their hands in distress, and occasionally malign an Israeli leader. Human rights groups condemn the activities, which is something of an embarrassment given historic Jewish commitment to the rights of man. The settlements cost Israel money, time, human and military resources, prestige, legitimacy, friends, trustworthiness. They are, at first glance, a strategic liability.
Until you look at the settlers themselves.
Israeli soldiers are bound, however loosely, by a code of conduct. Israel likes to claim that its soldiers are the most humane in the world, though at least one late Palestinian protester would beg to disagree if he still had a face. Israeli settlers are not. It speaks volumes about our media that Katyusha rockets with a dismal (or, objectively, happy) casualty count generate more attention that repeated and escalating settler attacks on mosques, homes, and individuals themselves.
And what better way to remind Palestinians, even as they welcome home their recently detained, of their place than to send a group of religious zealots into their midst, to do the work that really could backfire on the slick PR machine that is Israeli foreign policy?
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