Prime Minister Sharon was looking for an opportunity to correct an impression he made in an interview last month, and he found it yesterday. Exactly a month ago, Sharon told the Ha'aretz newspaper that he would agree to remove some Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria as part of a comprehensive peace arrangement with the PA. Under certain circumstances, he said, "we will have to take steps that are painful for every Jew, and painful for me personally... We are talking about the cradle of the Jewish people. Our whole history is bound up with these places. Bethlehem, Shilo, Beit El. And I know that we will have to part with some of these places. There will be a parting from places that are connected to the whole course of our history. As a Jew, this agonizes me…"
Yesterday, he made it clear that he did not mean that Beit El and Shilo would be dismantled. "If you ask me whether in Beit El there will not be Jews," Sharon told The Jerusalem Post, "no. Jews will live there," making it clear that it would not be under Arab sovereignty. "Do you see a possibility of Jews living under Arab sovereignty?" he asked rhetorically. "I'm asking you, do you see that possibility?"
Yaakov (Ketzaleh) Katz, who served in 1990-92 as top aide to then-Housing Minister Ariel Sharon, says he has no doubt of Sharon's commitment to the Jewish residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza. "I worked with him during the years of record-level construction in Yesha, when over 40,000 homes were built in Yesha and eastern Jerusalem," Ketzaleh said today, "and I can tell you that the fact that there are half-a-million Jews in Yesha today - including a quarter of a million in Jerusalem and a quarter of a million elsewhere in Yesha - is very much due to his actions and his efforts."
Ketzaleh, who served and was wounded in the Yom Kippur War as a commander of one of Gen. Sharon's commando forces, and who is currently the Executive Director of Beit El Yeshiva Center Institutions and Arutz-7, continued, "After his amazing lifetime achievements in building up Yesha, I have no doubt that Arik Sharon will not lend his hand to uprooting even one community in Yesha. Take a look at the numbers. Most of the Jews in Jerusalem today live in areas that were liberated in 1967. And I'm not talking about Maaleh Adumim, which has 35,000 people - but rather Pisgat Ze'ev, Gilo, and the other Jerusalem neighborhoods... And look at the other cities in Yesha: Beitar - 26,000. Kiryat Sefer - 25,000. Ariel - 22,000. Kiryat Arba, and Efrat, and Beit El - between 8,000 and 11,000. Many of these began as little towns or outposts, and, with Sharon's help, have now grown to cities - and the same will be true of the outposts of today."
The Prime Minister also told the Post that he has not come under heavy pressure from the US administration to dismantle settlements or settlement outposts, and that it is not currently an issue. The only pressure is "from the Jews on themselves," he said. Sharon also repeated that which he told Ynet shortly beforehand (and which was reported by Arutz-7 yesterday), that he supports a Palestinian state as a "solution for the Palestinian people and the refugees." He did not explain, however, how a state of up to seven million Arabs in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza would not pose a demographic and physical threat to Israel. Sharon emphasized again that no progress on the Road Map will be made until Israel's strict security demands - namely, concrete actions against terrorists - are met.
Prime Minister Sharon will meet with Abu Mazen this Saturday night, for the first time since the latter became the new prime minister of the PA. The next day, Sharon will depart for Washington and his Road Map meetings with U.S. President George Bush.
Yesterday, he made it clear that he did not mean that Beit El and Shilo would be dismantled. "If you ask me whether in Beit El there will not be Jews," Sharon told The Jerusalem Post, "no. Jews will live there," making it clear that it would not be under Arab sovereignty. "Do you see a possibility of Jews living under Arab sovereignty?" he asked rhetorically. "I'm asking you, do you see that possibility?"
Yaakov (Ketzaleh) Katz, who served in 1990-92 as top aide to then-Housing Minister Ariel Sharon, says he has no doubt of Sharon's commitment to the Jewish residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza. "I worked with him during the years of record-level construction in Yesha, when over 40,000 homes were built in Yesha and eastern Jerusalem," Ketzaleh said today, "and I can tell you that the fact that there are half-a-million Jews in Yesha today - including a quarter of a million in Jerusalem and a quarter of a million elsewhere in Yesha - is very much due to his actions and his efforts."
Ketzaleh, who served and was wounded in the Yom Kippur War as a commander of one of Gen. Sharon's commando forces, and who is currently the Executive Director of Beit El Yeshiva Center Institutions and Arutz-7, continued, "After his amazing lifetime achievements in building up Yesha, I have no doubt that Arik Sharon will not lend his hand to uprooting even one community in Yesha. Take a look at the numbers. Most of the Jews in Jerusalem today live in areas that were liberated in 1967. And I'm not talking about Maaleh Adumim, which has 35,000 people - but rather Pisgat Ze'ev, Gilo, and the other Jerusalem neighborhoods... And look at the other cities in Yesha: Beitar - 26,000. Kiryat Sefer - 25,000. Ariel - 22,000. Kiryat Arba, and Efrat, and Beit El - between 8,000 and 11,000. Many of these began as little towns or outposts, and, with Sharon's help, have now grown to cities - and the same will be true of the outposts of today."
The Prime Minister also told the Post that he has not come under heavy pressure from the US administration to dismantle settlements or settlement outposts, and that it is not currently an issue. The only pressure is "from the Jews on themselves," he said. Sharon also repeated that which he told Ynet shortly beforehand (and which was reported by Arutz-7 yesterday), that he supports a Palestinian state as a "solution for the Palestinian people and the refugees." He did not explain, however, how a state of up to seven million Arabs in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza would not pose a demographic and physical threat to Israel. Sharon emphasized again that no progress on the Road Map will be made until Israel's strict security demands - namely, concrete actions against terrorists - are met.
Prime Minister Sharon will meet with Abu Mazen this Saturday night, for the first time since the latter became the new prime minister of the PA. The next day, Sharon will depart for Washington and his Road Map meetings with U.S. President George Bush.