Israel moved ahead yesterday with plans to build nearly 1,200 homes for Jewish settlers, holding fast to a settlement policy as cabinet ministers met to approve a release of Palestinian prisoners ahead of peace talks.
Israel has made a push on settlements since the resumption on July 30 of US-brokered talks on Palestinian statehood, signalling its intention to continue to build in major enclaves it wants to keep in any future peace deal.
While condemning settlement expansion, Palestinians have stopped short of threatening outright to abandon the negotiations, which are due to go into a second round in Jerusalem on Wednesday after a session in Washington.
Israeli media, in unconfirmed reports, have suggested yesterday’s housing plans were disclosed to Washington in advance and were aimed partly at overcoming opposition within the pro-settlement cabinet to prisoner releases designed to spur negotiations halted three
years ago.
The Housing Ministry said on its website that tenders were issued for building 793 new apartments in areas of the West Bank that Israel annexed after capturing the territory and the eastern part of Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war.
Plots for the construction of 394 more units were being sold in Ariel, Efrat, Maale Adumim and Betar, settlements in areas Israel has said it aims to retain in any land-for-peace accord.
“We shall continue with construction, everywhere,” Housing Minister Uri Ariel of the far-right Jewish Home party said at the formal relaunch of an Israeli housing project in East Jerusalem yesterday.
Ariel said his party would vote against the release of Palestinian prisoners, saying he was “against freeing terrorists. It goes against our security interests”.
Israeli Finance Minister Yair Lapid, whose centrist party is right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s biggest partner in the governing coalition, called the decision to issue the settlement housing tenders “unhelpful to the peace process”.
Mark Regev, an Israeli government spokesman, dismissed the criticism saying: “The construction decided upon today in Jerusalem and in the settlement blocs are in areas that will remain part of Israel in any possible future peace agreement. This in no way changes the final map of peace. It changes nothing.”
Drawing Palestinian anger, Israel’s military-run Civil Administration in the West Bank gave preliminary approval on Thursday for the construction of more than 800 new settler homes — some of them in isolated settlements — but said it needed government approval before building could begin.
Most world powers regard all the settlements as illegal and Palestinians say the enclaves could deny them a viable and contiguous state.
“The international community must stand with this peace process and must stand shoulder to shoulder with us and hold Israel accountable for its continuing settlement activities,” Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said.
REUTERS
Netanyahu undergoes surgery
JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was released from hospital yesterday hours after undergoing successful hernia surgery, but doctors said he would require several days’ rest to make a full recovery.
During the overnight procedure, which took around an hour and required general anaesthetic, Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon temporarily assumed the 63-year-old premier’s powers, Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
Yuval Weiss, director of the Jerusalem hospital where the surgery took place, said the operation was ordered at short notice as a precaution against Netanyahu’s condition deteriorating. Netanyahu’s office said he had been diagnosed after complaining of abdominal pain.
A statement from Netanyahu’s office said he had reassumed his powers of office, and a short time later he was released from the hospital, where a statement quoted him as saying, “I’m feeling fine.”
REUTERS
26 Palestinian prisoners to be released
JERUSALEM: The Israeli government approved late yesterday the release of 26 veteran Palestinian prisoners, an official statement said, ahead of renewed peace talks between the sides set for later this week.
“Following the government decision to renew peace talks with the Palestinians and appoint a ministerial committee to free prisoners during negotiations… the committee approved the release of 26 prisoners,” a statement from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office read.
According to the statement, the names will be published on the Israel prison service’s website early on Monday, “after the bereaved families will receive notice”.
“On the list approved are 14 prisoners who will be transferred to Gaza and 12 from Judaea and Samaria,” the biblical term for the West Bank, the statement continued.
“Eight of the prisoners on the list were set to be freed in the upcoming three years, two of them in the next six months,” said the statement. “The release of the prisoners will take place at least 48 hours after publishing the list.”
According to the statement, the three ministers on the panel — Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and Science and Technology Minister Yaakov Peri, a former head of the Shin Bet security agency — stressed that “if one of those released returned to hostile activities against Israel, he will be returned to complete his sentence.”
The 26 constitute the first batch of a total of 104 long-term Palestinian and Israeli Arab prisoners, in jail since before the 1993 Oslo peace accords, who were to be freed in four stages, depending on progress in the talks.
According to media reports, most of them were involved in attacks that killed Israelis, and the families were expected to appeal to the High Court of Justice against the impending release.
Source:AFP
