Correcting Oppression: Volume 4 - Settlements
I have heard it said that if Palestinians would lay down their arms, there would be peace. If Israel were to lay down their arms, there would be war.
The reality is, however, that both nations are aggressive in their opposition to peace in the Holy Land. This cute little quip is woefully ignorant of the true situation on the ground.
If Palestinians were to lay down their arms, calm down, and get in line with the status quo, what would actually happen would be that Israel would slowly but surely annex more and more land, push Palestinians further and further out, and eventually completely eliminate them as majority presence in the land or worse as people group all together. This is not dramatic - this is happening. It is also what Netanyahu and his far right government have admitted to. It may not be as overt as shooting rockets but it is deeply aggressive nonetheless. I don’t think any of us would take that lying down, if we’re honest.
The reality is, neither country wants anything less than all the land. Neither country is happy with any division of the land. The sooner we realize that Israel as well as Palestine is in opposition to this reality, we’ll have made a step forward.
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Each year more and more Israelis move to the West Bank. The West Bank is land that has been allocated to the Palestinians. However, Settlements not only continue to grow in the West Bank, but there also continues to be plans for more to be built.
A Settlement is essentially a gated neighborhood in the Palestinian Territories that is built for Israelis to live in. Within this gated neighborhood you have everything you need: schools, grocery stores, parks, and offices. They are little cities that Israel has been, and will continue to, build across a vast piece of land that does not belong to them by any standard. Even the US, a strong ally, has spoken out against the continual building of Settlements in their direct opposition to peace.
Israeli Settlements are built on land that Palestinians physically hold the deed to. Just this past year Netanyahu has approved over 5,000 new housing units across the West Bank. The US, along with a host of other nations, condemned this action to no avail.
These neighborhoods are also where many of the ultra-Zionest and sometimes violent Israelis choose to live. Historically there have been attacks by Settlers on Palestinians. The mindset of many living in Settlements is a Zionist mindset. Meaning, “this land is ours to take, given by God and we will take it no matter the cost.”
This is not the face of a reasonable party negotiating with a lunatic. We have made the picture that Israel is the reasonable party and Palestine is the crazy, unreasonable one. This is the wrong story. They are both violently unreasonable on different counts. One just has more influence and fire power. And they are using both. And winning.