Olmert: Israel will keep West Bank settlement blocs
Israel’s acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said today that Israel will give up territory and relinquish control over most of the West Bank’s Palestinians, while holding on to main settlement blocs.
It was seen as his clearest statement yet about how he sees Israel’s final borders.
In his first broadcast interview since taking power last month, Olmert told Channel 2 TV that if his Kadima Party wins March 28 elections, Israel would hold on to Jerusalem and three major West Bank settlement blocs, along with the strategic Jordan River valley, and it might move by itself if no agreement can be reached with the Palestinians.
“We will disengage from most of the Palestinian population that lives in Judea and Samaria,” Olmert said, using the biblical names for the West Bank.
“That will obligate us to leave territories under Israeli control today.”
Israel withdrew from Gaza in the summer, but violence continues there. Two Palestinian militants were killed in an Israeli air strike today.
Olmert said Israel would retain “united Jerusalem”, a term understood as encompassing the eastern section claimed by the Palestinians for the capital of the state they hope to create.
Today, he toured construction sites of the separation barrier Israel is building in the Jerusalem area and said its completion is a top priority.
The barrier is to extend along the length of the West Bank, dipping into the territory to encircle the settlements Olmert listed. Israel says it is necessary to keep suicide bombers out, but Palestinians denounce it as a land grab.
About three-quarters of Israel’s 244,000 West Bank settlers live in the areas Olmert delineated in the TV interview, according to government figures and estimates by the Peace Now settlement watchdog group.
The bloc around the settlement of Ariel is deepest inside the West Bank, at 10 miles. Gush Etzion and Maaleh Adumim are Jerusalem suburbs.
While stating specifically that the three blocs would remain in Israel, he used a different formula for the Jordan Rover valley: “It is impossible to abandon control of the eastern border of Israel,” he said, without referring to Israeli sovereignty or the string of small settlements there.
He refused to give more details.
Olmert also hinted that Israel might carry out further unilateral withdrawals - especially now that Hamas militants sworn to Israel’s destruction have swept Palestinian elections.
“We are going toward separation from the Palestinians,” he said. “We are going toward determining a permanent border for the state of Israel.”
Negotiations aimed at a peace treaty and a permanent border between Israel and the West Bank have been frozen for years. The Palestinians claim the whole territory, but Israel says the border is defined only by a ceasefire line and is negotiable.
In today’s air strike, the Israeli military said it targeted a car in Gaza City carrying Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades militants involved in producing rockets to be fired at Israel.
Earlier, Israeli artillery and aircraft pounded northern Gaza, where militants have been launching rockets. Three landed in Israel on Tuesday, causing some damage.
Two militants were killed instantly and five bystanders were wounded, including two children. Al Aqsa identified the dead as senior commanders and threatened revenge. Since last Thursday, Israel has killed nine Gaza militants in air strikes.
