National Security Council director Maj.-Gen. Uzi Dayan formally presented the plan, dubbed "enveloping Jerusalem," yesterday to Sharon and Internal Security Minister Uzi Landau. The plan involves erecting some 11 kilometers of walls along Jerusalem's municipal boundaries and aims to create other obstacles stretching for over 50 km to greatly enhance security for the city, which has been torn by scores of terrorist attacks.
So Israel wants to become 1961 Germany.
They must be so pleased.
To be sure, this particular plan has been deemed "impractical". (You do wonder at the madness of the man proposing it. I mean, he states that the Palestinians "harm Israel's economy by working in Israel". Um, excuse me, but don't most of them actually live there? How on earth can you harm the economy of your home by contributing to it? For that matter, how can you harm the economy by working peacefully? In order to have a job, they need peace as much, if not more, than anyone else in Israel.)
You wonder how far Israel will be willing to go in this search for security. A security which demographics alone say that they can never find. Unless they're willing to expel all Arabs from inside the state and wall them into the West Bank and Gaza, they can't be secure. The problem is, at this point, they are desperate both to do something, and to be seen to do something.
Posted by iain at January 30, 2002 12:55 AMComments
Actually, one of the more strange things about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is that a lot of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza actually do work in Israel itself. They cross the border every day, go to work in Israel, and then return home each evening.
Israel uses them for low-cost labor to do menial jobs, just as racial underclasses are used all over the world. (Like, say, we here in SoCal use Mexicans.)
Posted by Steven Den Beste at January 30, 2002 1:15 AM