Rabbis denounce Sharon's moves on settlements
A number of Israeli rabbis today denounced Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s decision to knock down several tiny illegal West Bank outposts as part of the US-backed road map to peace.
The move to dismantle the settlements was “wretched and contemptible” and a “crime from a Jewish, national and moral point of view,” the rabbis said in a joint statement.
Many settlers are observant Jews, and the rabbis’ statement was expected to rally many more of them to the hilltop outposts and into possible confrontations with the soldiers.
Israeli troops knocked down empty mobile homes and water towers at 10 tiny settlements in the West Bank overnight.
Palestinians officials have dismissed Sharon’s effort to remove the outposts - most of which are uninhabited – as a deception.
Palestinian Cabinet Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said that by dismantling a few small settlements, the Israeli leader was seeking “to give legitimacy” to dozens of other larger ones established during his term.
By this morning, Israeli troops had taken down 10 uninhabited enclaves. Five more outposts, four of them inhabited, were to be removed today.
Radio reports said hundreds of settlers had converged on the four outposts overnight, hoping to disrupt the evictions.
Israel’s Supreme Court issued a temporary injunction against the evacuation of settlers from one of the populated outposts, Havat Gilad, until a hearing later today.
Meanwhile, the new Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas was dealing with his own opposition.
At last week’s Mideast summit he called for an end to the “military intefadeh” – attacks against Israelis by Palestinian militants.
In 32 months of violence, 782 people have been killed on the Israeli side and 2,370 on the Palestinian side.
Yesterday he criticised the militants after they brazenly rebuffed his call for peace by staging a bloody raid on an army post in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, killing four Israeli soldiers.
The three militants, one each from the main extremist groups, were killed.
“We must do our utmost to end the bloodshed and continue with the political process so we can convince the world that this is our path,” Abbas said.
Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman was expected to arrive today for talks with Palestinian Authority and Hamas leaders to try to revive truce talks, according to diplomatic sources in Cairo.
Abbas did not praise the removal of Israeli outposts, saying only that the Palestinians reject all the settlements as illegal, not just the tiny outposts.
According to the road map plan, settlements established since March 1, 2001 must be dismantled. Sharon pledged to remove illegal outposts, but he did not commit to a number.
Peace Now, a group that opposes settlements, says that 117 unauthorised outposts have been put up since 1996, 62 since March 1, 2001. Most have fewer than a dozen residents.
