http://www3.haaretz.co.il/eng/scripts/article.asp?id=51748&mador=1
Ha'aretz, July 19, 1999
Peace Now: Settlements flourishing
By Nadav Shragai
A Peace Now study indicating that settlement activity has
flourished since 1996 - even following the Wye accords - will form
the basis of a cabinet discussion next week regarding the future
of satellite settlements to existing towns in the territories.
The discussion, requested by Yossi Sarid, will use the distance
from the mother settlement to its satellite as a primary criterion
for determining the settlement's future. Meretz and its allies are
pushing Barak to decide the fate of the settlements before final
status talks, but they will encounter fierce opposition from the
NRP and Yisrael b'Aliyah.
During the coalition negotiations, Barak promised Yisrael
b'Aliyah leader Natan Sharansky and NRP members that satellite
settlements approved by the defense establishment, and that lie
within the official borders of their mother settlement, would be
allowed to remain in place at least until the final status
negotiations. The Peace Now study shows that 20 of the 42
settlements established since 1996 are within 1,000 meters of
their mother settlements. However, 13 are between 1,000 and 2,500
meters away and four are more than 2.5 kilometers from their
mother settlements. The study was only able to determine
statistics for 39 of the 42 settlements.
The vast majority of these settlements were built without
official permission, but were later approved by the Defense
Ministry, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former
Defense Minister Moshe Arens.
Peace Now members said they were upset by the fact that 29 of
the 42 new settlements were established after the signing of the
Wye Accord. Its settlement tracking team was further dismayed to
report on Saturday that the settlers have expanded satellites
established over the past year, despite assurances to Barak that
they would not try to establish any new facts on the ground.
The team's research found that two caravans were added to a
satellite established just after the elections 2.5 kilometers
south of Itamar; two caravans were added to Har Kabir, near Elon
Moreh; and three were added to Harasha, a satellite of Talmon. The
organization also reported that Tzofit, near Halamish, grew by 15
caravans, and that a permanent building is being erected next to a
caravan 200 meters outside of Ateret.
Peace Now complained that Barak's government is following in
Netanyahu's footsteps by ignoring complaints made against
settlements. The movement charged that time has now run out, and
Barak is wasting the last bit of "overtime" remaining in which to
stop the settlements from establishing irreversible facts on the
ground before the start of final status negotiations.
The Central Bureau of Statistics published data yesterday which
showed that settlement in the territories was on the rise.
According to their statistics, 166,100 Jews were living in Judea
and Samaria at the end of 1998, a 7.6 percent rise for the year,
while 6,400 Jews were living in the Gaza Strip - fully 12 percent
more than there were at the end of 1997.
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