Yesha Council veteran Pinchas Wallerstein said today that Maariv newspaper's portrayal of a new Council plan as one that will "divide Yesha" is unfair and incorrect.
Maariv reports today, following similar reports in a local Yesha newspaper several weeks ago, that the Council is working on a plan to divide Yesha into Jewish and autonomous Arab cantons, and that will basically ceded 30% of Yesha to the Palestinian Authority. Each Jewish area will be connected by "Israeli" roads, and each Arab area will be connected by "Palestinian" roads, obviating the need for "mixed" traffic - and for the removal of any Jewish communities. As of now, only the western Binyamin bloc - including Dolev, Chashmonaim, Kiryat Sefer, and others - has prepared such a "road map" plan, but the others are in the course of doing so. Many aspects of the plan have not been finalized, such as whether the Jewish areas will be fenced in or not.
Journalist Nadav Shragai of Haaretz told Arutz-7 that the plan as it currently stands includes some important guiding principles: A Palestinian state will not be established, nor will there be another sovereign entity west of the Jordan River; a demographic solution will be found to avoid the problem of controlling a foreign people, the Arab areas will be autonomous; and no Jewish community will be dismantled or removed.
Wallerstein told Arutz-7 today that contrary to the way it has been portrayed, "it's not a diplomatic plan at all, but only a transportation program. It's a way of showing that Jews and Arabs can co-exist here peacefully, if the Arabs agree, without having to remove even one Jewish town and without bothering even one Arab from traveling freely." He said that the government is supposed to vote next week on the placement of the security fence in western Binyamin, and "we fear that it may be placed precisely on the Green Line - which will of course have political ramifications, as if we have ceded all the area west of it. We want to show that there is no need to do this… There must be no intention to give foreign sovereignty to any piece of land west of the Jordan; that's exactly what was so terrible about Sharon's recent Road Map decision… Under our plan, Israel will retain complete authorities in terms of security over the entire Yesha."
Maariv reports today, following similar reports in a local Yesha newspaper several weeks ago, that the Council is working on a plan to divide Yesha into Jewish and autonomous Arab cantons, and that will basically ceded 30% of Yesha to the Palestinian Authority. Each Jewish area will be connected by "Israeli" roads, and each Arab area will be connected by "Palestinian" roads, obviating the need for "mixed" traffic - and for the removal of any Jewish communities. As of now, only the western Binyamin bloc - including Dolev, Chashmonaim, Kiryat Sefer, and others - has prepared such a "road map" plan, but the others are in the course of doing so. Many aspects of the plan have not been finalized, such as whether the Jewish areas will be fenced in or not.
Journalist Nadav Shragai of Haaretz told Arutz-7 that the plan as it currently stands includes some important guiding principles: A Palestinian state will not be established, nor will there be another sovereign entity west of the Jordan River; a demographic solution will be found to avoid the problem of controlling a foreign people, the Arab areas will be autonomous; and no Jewish community will be dismantled or removed.
Wallerstein told Arutz-7 today that contrary to the way it has been portrayed, "it's not a diplomatic plan at all, but only a transportation program. It's a way of showing that Jews and Arabs can co-exist here peacefully, if the Arabs agree, without having to remove even one Jewish town and without bothering even one Arab from traveling freely." He said that the government is supposed to vote next week on the placement of the security fence in western Binyamin, and "we fear that it may be placed precisely on the Green Line - which will of course have political ramifications, as if we have ceded all the area west of it. We want to show that there is no need to do this… There must be no intention to give foreign sovereignty to any piece of land west of the Jordan; that's exactly what was so terrible about Sharon's recent Road Map decision… Under our plan, Israel will retain complete authorities in terms of security over the entire Yesha."