Does Settlements Freeze Deal Make Sense?

Freeze debate should take into account some facts about settlements, US politics

by Yoram Ettinger








1. The complex nature of Jewish construction in the settlements:

* If Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria prejudges the outcome of negotiation, wouldn't Palestinian construction in Judea and Samaria have the same effect?!

* If the uprooting of Jewish communities advances peace, why would the uprooting of Arab communities undermine peace?!

* The call for uprooting Arabs is immoral; isn't the uprooting of Jews just as immoral?!

* If the 300,000 Jews, among 1.5 million Arabs, in Judea and Samaria constitute an obstacle to peace, how would one define the 1.5 million Arabs, among 6 million Jews, within pre-1967 Israel?!

* If Jewish settlements/communities in Judea and Samaria (established1967) constitute the obstacle to peace, why was the PLO established in 1964?! Why did anti-Jewish Palestinian terrorism flare up during the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s?! Why did the Arab-Israel wars erupt in1948/9, 1956 and 1967? Why did an unprecedented Palestinian terrorism surge follow the 1993 Oslo Accord and the 2005 uprooting of 25 Jewish communities in Gaza and Northern Samaria?!

* Past freezes, slowdowns and dismantling of Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria intensified pressure and exacerbated terrorism – what would be the impact of another freeze?!

2. White House promises, guarantees and commitments by US presidents are evasive and illusive:

They are replete with escape routes, ambiguity, non-automaticity, and always subject to US' – and not the recipient's – interests. Even the tightest US treaty – with NATO – allows the US to consider the activation of military force.

3. Precedents of US commitments raise doubts:

* The 1954 US-Taiwan defense treaty was concluded by President Eisenhower and terminated by President Carter in 1979.

* In 1957, Israel retreated from the Sinai Peninsula in exchange for President Eisenhower's Executive Agreement, which committed US military deployment should Egypt violate Sinai's demilitarization and blockade Eilat.

* In 1967, Egypt violated Sinai's demilitarization and blockaded Eilat, but President Johnson declared his predecessor's commitment non-binding.

* In 1975, President Ford sent an official letter to Prime Minister Rabin, declaring that the US shall give great weight to Israel's position that the Golan Heights should remain under Israel's control. In 1979, President Carter declared Ford's letter non-committal.

* In 1982, President Reagan stipulated – in order to overcome Congressional opposition – that the F-15s sold to Saudi Arabia would not be stationed in Tabuq, south of Eilat. In 2003, President Bush justified the Saudi deployment of the fighter planes to Tabuq by altered strategic regional circumstances.

* In 1991 President Bush promised Prime Minister Shamir – in return for Israeli restraint in face of Iraqi Scud missiles - to favorably consider granting Israel $10 billion loan guarantees for the absorption of one million Soviet Jews, and to dedicate 30% of the bombing in West Iraq to the destruction of the Scud launchers. Prime Minister Shamir kept his side of the bargain; President Bush did not!

* In 2000, President Clinton promised Israel $800 million for the retreat from Southern Lebanon, none of which has reached Israel.

4. An American president is not omnipotent, and Congress has the capabilities to enhance US-Israel cooperation:

An American president represents one third of the US government, equal in power to the other third, the US Congress. Unlike the Parliamentarian system, a US president does not determine the list of candidates to the Legislature, the identity of congressional leaders, nor the slate of legislation to be introduced in Congress. A president is constrained by a robust system of checks and balances and by a complete separation of powers between the Executive and the Legislature.

It was Congress – sometimes in defiance of presidents - which terminated US military involvement in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Angola and Nicaragua, facilitated the Jewish Exodus from the USSR (the "Jackson-Vanik Amendment"), cut foreign aid to Turkey following the latter's invasion of Cyprus, accelerated the fall of South Africa's White Regime (overriding Reagan's veto), etc.

In 1991, Congress forced President Bush to transfer to Israel $700 million worth of military systems, in addition to a $650 million emergency grant and the refurbishing of the port of Haifa for the benefit of the Sixth Fleet.

5. Congress shares policy-making power, while possessing exclusive legislative power:

Congressional posture is bolstered during economic crises (e.g. currently) and presidential posture is enhanced during wartime.

In 1995 and 1999, Congress intended to force the president to transfer the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, but Israel's prime ministers urged Congress to temper the legislation, thus dooming the effort.
In October 1998 – a few days before the convening of the Wye Plantation Conference – Democratic congressional leaders told Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: "When it comes to opposing pressure on Israel, we are with Newt (Gingrich)." However, an Israeli prime minister pulled the rug from under their feet….

The US Congress – equipped with the Power of the Purse – has the Constitutional capabilities to initiate, suspend, amend and rescind policies. Congress can direct presidents to exercise the veto power at the UN Security Council, supply Israel with vital military systems in face of mutual threats, etc.

Will Jerusalem learn from history by repeating – or by avoiding – critical errors?!





Ynet News

West Bank Terrorists Target Israeli Vehicle

Terrorists fire at settler couple traveling near Bethlehem; No injuries reported in attack.

Another West Bank terror attack: An Israeli vehicle was fired at Saturday evening northwest of Bethlehem.

No injuries were reported in the shooting attack.

A couple residing in the settlement of Har Gilo was traveling from the Mount Hebron area to Jerusalem when it came under fire. Security forces identified bullet holes on the vehicle.

The driver of the car reported the attack when he arrived at the Ein Yael roadblock in the area. IDF troops were promptly dispatched to the shooting site and are scouring the area in an effort to apprehend the shooters.

More than a month ago, an Israeli couple sustained wounds in a shooting attack in the south Mount Hebron area. The woman hurt in that attack was at late stages of pregnancy and gave birth the same night at the hospital.

In late August, four Israelis were murdered in a West Bank shooting attack perpetrated by Hamas terrorists. About three weeks ago, IDF troops killed two terrorists involved in the attack.

Terrorists fire at Israeli vehicle

Ynet News

The Israeli Occupation and the Settlements

by Ted Belman

The pro-Palestinian propaganda machine has succeeded in stigmatizing the Israeli occupation and the settlements. Time and again we hear about the "brutal occupation" and the "illegal settlements".

We rarely hear the truth in opposition to these lies.

Occupation

Israel is accused of occupying the West Bank and Gaza. In fact these territories are described as "The occupied Palestinian territories." Not only are they not occupied in a legal sense, but also they are not "Palestinian" lands in a sovereign sense..

The Fourth Geneva Convention (FGC) is a treaty between signatory states that are called High Contracting Parties (HCP). It regulates the obligations of one HCP who occupies the land of another HCP.

It defines the terms "Occupying Power" and "Occupied State".

Thus this convention does not apply to the territories because they were not the land of any HCP. They have never been the land of an HCP. Prior to 1967, Jordon was in occupation of these territories, just as Israel is currently in occupation. Jordanian sovereignty over these lands was never recognized and ultimately Jordan relinquished any claims she claimed to have over these lands. The FGC was never applied when Jordan occupied the land and it shouldn't be applied now that Israel does.

Yet the International Court of Justice, when it gave an advisory opinion on the Israeli security fence, "identified Jordan as the occupied power of the West Bank".

According to David Matas, an international lawyer of considerable repute, in his well argued book Aftershock, "The judgment moves on from this legal reasoning to labeling the West Bank as Palestinian occupied territory. But this labelling is based on the ethnic composition of the West Bank, not on its legal status." [..] "This assertion by the ICJ that the West Bank is occupied territory is a contortion the Court imposed on the law to get to its desired results of slapping the label "occupier" on Israel." "[This] shows that the primary concern of the court was to connect to pro-Palestinian rhetoric".

As a result the Palestinians consider themselves the "occupied power".

Matas notes "That the Geneva Conventions on the Laws of War do not recognize the legal possibility of the occupation of a people, only the occupation of the territory of a state." A Protocol to these conventions does recognize such a possibility but Israel is not a signatory to it and is thus not bound by it.

It must be clearly understood that Israel's occupation is not illegal and the UN has never claimed it to be. In fact Resolution 242 permits Israel to remain in occupation until they have an agreement on "secure and recognized borders".

The Palestinians have no greater claim to a state than any minority group in any other state that wants a state of their own. The Basques and the Kurds come to mind. No one is demanding that they be given statehood.

When Israel's counsel acknowledged to Israel's High Court when it was deliberating on the fence, that Israel held the land in "belligerent occupation", he did so to enable the Court to use the law of occupation in its deliberations. It was not an admission that the lands were Palestinian land or that the FGC applied.

Matas also takes issue with Dore Gold and others for calling the land "disputed land", because others argue all of Israel is disputed land.

UNSC Res 242 sanctioned Israel's right to remain in occupation until such time as the parties reached an agreement on secure and recognized borders.

This resolution makes no mention of the FGC.

Israel has accepted the PA as the negotiating party. Nevertheless she knows the PA is currently an illegitimate government, having overstayed its mandate, and speaks for no one much less Hamas.

Settlements

The anti-Zionists argue the settlements are illegal and rely solely on the provisions of the Fourth Geneva Convention which provides that the Occupying power is prohibited from transferring civilian populations to occupied territories. They say that the prohibition against transfer includes a prohibition against encouragement to settle. The matter has never been put to a court for interpretation or determination. But the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) advises "that this provision was intended to prevent a practice adopted during the Second World War in which certain powers transferred portions of their populations to occupied territories for political and racial reasons or in order, as they claimed to colonize those territories."

Nazi Germany enforced two kinds of transfers but in both cases they were forced transfers. The victims were the persons being forced.

Transferring populations is not a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions. However a Protocol to the GC makes it so but Israel is not a party to the protocol and is not bound by it.

The anti-Zionists reject the notion that the proscription is against only forced transfers and argue that the FGC proscribes inducement to move as well. But how can there be a crime of inducement when the person committing the act, the settler, has done nothing wrong.

How can you be guilty of a crime by inducing someone to do something which is not a crime? Furthermore, this inducement would be a War Crime on an equal footing with Genocide. The equation is ludicrous. And if the settlers settle on their own volition and not due to inducements, what then? Also it is impossible to prosecute an occupying power. So what individuals would be held responsible?

Even if someone in Israel was convicted of offering inducements to settle, the settlers would not be affected and could remain in the settlements if they wished.

Matas opines, "The interpretation defies the ordinary understanding of criminal responsibility where the person committing the act is the primary wrongdoer and the person inducing the act is only an accessory."

Matas concludes. "There is all the difference in the world between forcible transfer, the offence of the Geneva Convention, and voluntary settlement, even where the settlement is encouraged" (by are merely providing inducements).[..] "Transfer is something that is done to people. Settlement is something people do."

The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court made it an offence to "directly or indirectly" transfer populations.

The ICRC has attempted to interpret "indirect transfers" as "inducements" thereby making them a crime. But the GC certainly does not and that currently is the prevailing opinion.

But that didn't prevent the ICJ, in its advisory opinion above noted, from finding that the settlements violated international law. No reasons were given and no authority cited. But elsewhere it expressed the opinion that the combination of the settlements and the fence amounted to de facto annexation. It ignored the fact that Israel took the position that the fence was not intended to be the border but was merely a security measure. While actual annexation may be a violation of the FGC, the settlements and the fence certainly were not.an annexation or a violation of the FGC.

What a legal stretch!

And what about the settlements on the west side of the fence? Are they an annexation too?

Thus the ICJ did not conclude that someone in Israel was guilty of inducing settlements or in any other way of transferring populations...

Matas expands on his dim view of the advisory opinion. He considers it an attempt to discredit Israel. In the end it discredited the ICJ. He prays that the ICC will be more judicious.

The ICJ, after all, is an organ of the UN who requested it to provide the opinion. Similarly the UN requested Goldstone to investigate Cast Lead and produce a report. This report, like the advisory opinion, was just what the UN "ordered".

But keep in mind that the opinion of the ICJ was just that, an opinion, and is not legally binding on anyone.

The US has traditionally, with the Carter administration being the only exception, refrained from describing the settlements as illegal and instead called them obstacles to peace. In September 2009, Obama went before the United Nations and declared "America does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements."

This is closer to Carter's position but falls short of declaring them illegal. Nevertheless, it prompted John Bolton to say "This is the most radical anti-Israel speech I can recall any president making."

All this ignores the fact that the Palestine Mandate encouraged close settlement of the land by Jews. This right has never been rescinded and the UN has no right to rescind it. . So Jews from anywhere have the right to settle on the West Bank and the PA and the UN has no right to say otherwise.

To demand that the future Palestinian state be Judenrein, free of Jews, is reprehensible and discriminatory.

The West should not condone it, but it does.




Ted Belman is a retired lawyer and the editor of Israpundit. He made aliya last year from Toronto and currently lives in Jerusalem

Think Israel

Obama and the Jews

by Burt Prelutsky

During the presidential campaign, a lot of people insisted that Obama was really a Muslim pretending to be a Christian.

I wasn't one of them.

I did figure, though, that if my name was Barack Hussein Obama and I was going to run for president a mere seven years after 9/11, I wouldn't admit I was a Muslim, either.

On the other hand, I, personally, would have sooner trusted a Muslim who'd been attending a mosque in Dearborn for 20 years than a Christian who'd been attending a racist, anti-American church in Chicago for all that time.

Anybody, after all, can claim to be a Christian.

The proof, in the words of that fabulous effing wordsmith, Joe Biden, is in the pudding, and when I learned that among Obama's friends and mentors were such notorious anti-Semites as Rev. Wright, Louis Farrakhan, Rashid Khalidi and Father Pfleger, it certainly kick-started my suspicions about his religious convictions. Still, as I saw it, when in Chicago, you do as Chicagoans do. And, that being the case, I figured that in such swampland, even if a saint were to wade into Chicago politics, he would eventually be knee-deep in snakes and alligators named Tony Rezko, Richard Daley and Bill Ayers.



However, once Obama was elected president and immediately jetted off to Egypt and Turkey to announce his kinship with the followers of Islam, all the while bad-mouthing America, I confess I began to feel a tad queasy. It didn't help that the self-anointed one seemed to think that he could make Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-il and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, heel solely by his mere presence.

Heck, judging by his lack of success in such matters, I'm willing to wager that even after all these months he hasn't managed to housebreak Bo. Speaking of which, I hate to think what the carpet in the Lincoln Bedroom looks like these days.

Like most Americans, I believe in giving a guy the benefit of the doubt, but once Mr. Doubt grabs his hat and scoots out the door, leaving me holding the check, I really hate feeling like a sucker.

The fact that so many other Americans feel the same way is reflected in Obama's free fall in the polls.

His recent rhetoric concerning Jerusalem and his subsequent boorish behavior towards Prime Minister Netanyahu convinces me that in his heart, at least, Obama is an Islamic. The anger and contempt that he has voiced, and that Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton have voiced on his behalf, over Jerusalem's zoning policy is outrageous and contemptible.

The Jews announce they plan to build 1200 housing units in Jerusalem and our president goes positively apeshit, but Hamas fires thousands of rockets into Israel and he doesn't say a word about it!

Clearly, it's none of our business whether or not Israel builds homes. Obviously if they weren't needed, they wouldn't be built. But there are other equally basic truths to consider. For one thing, Jerusalem is Israel's capital. How would we feel if a foreign country told us whether or not we could erect buildings in Washington, D.C.?

For another thing, it is Judaism's holiest city and always has been.

Three, it plays no part in Islamic history. Muhammad never even set foot in the place, meaning that it is one of the few locales in that part of the world where he and his ancient cronies never beheaded anyone.

Four, the only reason that Muslims now lay claim to it is in order to make trouble, which, as you may have noticed, is pretty much the only thing they've managed to produce over the past thousand years.

This brings us to what countless American presidents and secretaries of state have persisted in calling a peace process. And who would have ever guessed that all of those rather sober-sided ladies and gentlemen possessed such a marvelous sense of whimsy?

There is, as all rational people realize, no such thing as a peace process in the Middle East. There are merely two opposing sides.

On one side are those dedicated to wiping Israel off the map, which in fact they've already done on their own maps, and who also just happen to be America's sworn enemies.

On the other side is Israel, a western-style democracy that is home to over a million Arabs, a nation that foolishly keeps trying to bribe the opposition by handing over its legal property, only to discover that its enemies are not bought off as easily as Democratic congressmen.

Speaking of American politicians, I'm aware that a lot of people assumed that Obama would be a strong ally of Israel's because he had people like Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod in his inner-circle, and that the outer-circle was filled with such heavy-hitters as Charles Schumer, Barney Frank, Arlen Specter, Henry Waxman, Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein, Brad Sherman, Al Franken, Bernie Sanders and more than 30 other Jewish congressmen and senators.

But there really is no excuse for such gullibility in 2010. Anyone who doesn't understand that these days, Jewish politicians are liberals first, last and always, and have greater allegiance to Barack Obama and Karl Marx than to Thomas Jefferson and Moses, just hasn't been paying attention.

I have no way of knowing if they'll ever find space for Obama on Mount Rushmore, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if some day there's an Obama Boulevard in downtown Tehran.

A while back I wrote a line that is truer and more pertinent now than when I first wrote it: I sincerely hope that when Obama goes in for his annual checkup, the doctors at Bethesda will do a brain scan. For surely there must be something terribly wrong with a man who seems to be far more concerned with a Jew building a house in Israel than with Muslims building a nuclear bomb in Iran.

Burt Prelutsky has been a humor columnist for the L.A. Times and a movie critic for Los Angeles magazine. He is the author of Conservatives are from Mars (Liberals are from San Francisco).

A Jew-Free Palestine

BIbi should open talks by bringing up Arab demand to expel all West Bank Jews.
By: Eliyakim Haetzni

As Netanyahu embarks on his trip to Washington, we would do well to remember that his hold on power is premised on his followers’ assumption (may he forgive me) that he’s lying. They do not believe him when he says that he truly endorses the establishment of a Palestinian state and are convinced that he’s just pretending.

The prime minister indeed boasts to the Americans that he is the only one who can elicit the nation’s support for the “two-state solution” (Sharon boasted similarly before him); However, Netanyahu is not telling them (and possibly not telling himself either) that this achievement is premised on his followers’ conviction that he’s lying to the whole world, and that only they know the truth.

Netanyahu still faces the sobering up test, if and when the “National Camp” discovers that it fell victim to self-deception and that when Netanyahu “spoke Palestinian” he in fact did utter the truth and meant every word. Such cruel wake-up call prompted a rebellion against Sharon among Likud ranks and led to a party split. According to the last Likud members’ survey, the situation today is no different.

The litmus test here is the construction freeze. Should Netanyahu extend it, even if “only” in “isolated” communities (there are no less than 100 of those!), everyone would understand that he is suffocating the settlement enterprise and nobody would be able to provide another explanation. Netanyahu will then be welcomed into the group that includes Peres, Barak, and Tzipi Livni too. The political earthquake that shall follow would go beyond the Richter Scale.

And here’s another pre-talks thought: The negotiations may be thwarted at its outset not by the settlements, but rather, by the linkage between a Palestinian state and the expulsion of Jews. The commonly accepted axiom is that a Palestinian state will necessarily entail “clearing” the area of Jews, along with the outrageous assumption that this ethnic cleansing must be undertaken by Jewish police officers.

What about Arab villages?
Meanwhile, Arab villages continue to exist in the area between the “Ariel Bloc” and the Green Line. Does anyone even think of uprooting them? It’s clear to all that any “solution” would have to take their existence into account, and any construction within them therefore lacks any political significance.

Yet should Netanyahu declare that the status of Jewish communities is no different, and that the Palestinian state would have to reconcile itself to its Jews just like Israel reconciled itself to its Arabs, Jewish construction will no longer be a political news item.

Netanyahu must also ask his interlocutors the following questions: Did the agreement signed in Ireland call for the expulsion of Protestants or Catholics? Were the Germans or French expelled from Alsace-Lorraine? And did NATO allow the Serbs to expel Muslims from Kosovo? America and Europe wouldn’t be sending their armies in order to forcefully uproot Jews from the settlements; where did Israel commit to perform such act of hara-kiri?

During the negotiations, everything will be “on the table,” including the arrangements governing the lives of Jews who wish to live in a Palestinian State, while Arabs live in the Jewish State. Had Netanyahu opened the talks this way, and the Arabs would have insisted to “clear” the area of any Jews, this rather than the freeze would have turned into the major question here – and on this front we hold all the cards.

After all, such Arab demand gives off a stench of Nazi racism. So why does Israel foolishly renounce such card to begin with?

And a footnote: The above refers to Netanyahu’s two-state vision. This writer views any kind of Palestinian state to be established in the western Land of Israel as an existential threat for Israel.


Ynet News

Israel’s Security Fence

by Mitchell Bard

After scores of suicide bombings and daily terrorist attacks against its civilians that have killed more than 850 people and wounded thousands more since September 2000, Israel’s unity government decided to construct a security fence near the northern part of the pre-1967 “Green Line” between Israel and the West Bank to prevent Palestinian terrorists from infiltrating into Israeli population centers. The project has had the overwhelming support of the Israeli public which sees the barrier as vital to their security.

There is actually nothing new about the construction of a security fence. Many other nations have fences to protect their borders (the United States is building one now to keep out illegal Mexican immigrants). Israel has similar barriers along its borders with Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan. In fact, a fence already surrounds the Gaza Strip and not a single suicide bomber has managed to get across the Gaza barrier into Israel. Ironically, after condemning Israel's barrier, the UN announced plans to build its own fence to improve security around its New York headquarters.

Israel is Forced to Act
The Palestinians committed themselves in the Oslo accords and in the road map to dismantle terrorist networks and confiscate illegal weapons. After more than 10 years of negotiations, and a mounting toll of Israeli civilian casualties, however, it became clear to the Israeli people that the Palestinian Authority (PA) made a strategic choice to use terror to achieve its aims and that something had to be done to protect the civilian population.

“It obliges us to establish a barrier wall which is the only thing that can minimize the infiltration of these male and female suicide bombers,” said Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, who has emphasized that “the fence is not political, [and] is not a border.”

Some Israelis oppose the fence either because they fear it will constitute a recognition of the 1949 armistice line as a final border. Jews living in the West Bank, beyond the planned route of the fence, in particular, argue that they are now being left relatively unprotected and worry that they might be forced to relocate behind the fence if it does become a political border in the future.

Making Terrorism More Difficult
Before the construction of the fence, and in many places where it has not yet been completed, a terrorist need only walk across an invisible line to cross from the West Bank into Israel. No barriers of any kind exist, so it is easy to see how a barrier, no matter how imperfect, won't at least make the terrorists' job more difficult. Approximately 75 percent ofthe suicide bombers who attacked targets inside Israel came from across the border where the first phase of the fence was built.

During the 34 months from the beginning of the violence in September 2000 until the construction of the first continuous segment of the security fence at the end of July 2003, Samaria-based terrorists carried out 73 attacks in which 293 Israelis were killed and 1950 wounded. In the 11 months between the erection of the first segment at the beginning of August 2003 and the end of June 2004, only three attacks were successful, and all three occurred in the first half of 2003.

Since construction of the fence began, the number of attacks has declined by more than 90%. The number of Israelis murdered and wounded has decreased by more than 70% and 85%, respectively, after erection of the fence.

Even the Palestinian terrorists have addmitted the fence is a deterrent. On November 11, 2006, Islamic Jihad leader Abdallah Ramadan Shalah said on Al-Manar TV the terrorist organizations had every intention of continuing suicide bombing attacks, but that their timing and the possibility of implementing them from the West Bank depended on other factors. “For example,” he said, “there is the separation fence, which is an obstacle to the resistance, and if it were not there the situation would be entirely different.”

The success of the anti-terrorist fence in Samaria means that the launching point for terrorists has been moved to Judea, where there is not yet a continuous fence.



A High-Tech Fence
Although critics have sought to portray the security fence as a kind of "Berlin Wall," it is nothing of the sort. First, unlike the Berlin Wall, the fence does not separate one people, Germans from Germans, and deny freedom to those on one side. Israel's security fence separates two peoples, Israelis and Palestinians, and offers freedom and security for both. Second, while Israelis are fully prepared to live with Palestinians, and 20 percent of the Israeli population is already Arab, it is the Palestinians who say they do not want to live with any Jews and call for the West Bank to be judenrein. Third, the fence is not being constructed to prevent the citizens of one state from escaping; it is designed solely to keep terrorists out of Israel. Finally, only a tiny fraction of the total length of the barrier (less than 3% or about 10 miles) is actually a 30 foot high concrete wall, and that is being built in three areas where it will prevent Palestinian snipers from around the terrorist hotbeds of Kalkilya and Tul Karm from shooting at cars as they have done for the last three years along the Trans-Israel Highway, one of the country's main roads. The wall also takes up less space than the other barriers, only about seven feet, so it did not have a great impact on the area where it was built.

Most of the barrier will be a chain-link type fence similar to those used all over the United States combined with underground and long-range sensors, unmanned aerial vehicles, trenches, landmines and guard paths. Manned checkpoints will constitute the only way to travel back and forth through the fence. The barrier is altogether about 160 feet wide in most places.

The land used in building the security fence is seized for military purposes, not confiscated, and it remains the property of the owner. Legal procedures are already in place to allow every owner to file an objection to the seizure of their land. Moreover, property owners are offered compensation for the use of their land and for any damage to their trees.





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