Sovereignty over Judea and Samaria Conference

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By: Jewish Press Staff

Published: December 23rd, 2012

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The Women in Green movement has now begun the preparations for the third conference for the application of Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria. Following the success of the first two conferences, the movement expects large numbers of participants to come from all over Israel.

The third conference will be held in about two weeks (Tuesday, January 1, 2013) in the Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem, with the participation of prominent personalities: government ministers, Members of Knesset, rabbis, academics, and other public figures.

The conference is being organized and produced by Women in Green and co-sponsored by Just Peace For Israel and the Jewish Press.com.

Lectures will be in Hebrew with simultaneous translation into English.

The conference organizers, Women in Green leaders Yehudit Katsover and Nadia Matar, say that the upcoming conference will focus on providing answers to questions that have arisen regarding the call for the application of Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria.

Among the speakers at the conference, Minister of Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs Yuli Edelstein will relate to the international consequences of the application of sovereignty; coalition chairman MK Zeev Elkin will speak on the natural transition from the content of the Edmond Levy report to the application of sovereignty; MK Yariv Levin will talk about the question of legislation in the Knesset; Moshe Feiglin, Chairman, Jewish Leadership in the Likud, will offer guidelines on the way to turn declarations into actual political action; Rabbi Eli Ben Dahan, Knesset candidate on the Habayit Hayehudi list, will address the moral aspect of the application of sovereignty over the Promised Land of Eretz Israel.

Katsover and Matar further speaking of the contents of the upcoming conference: “Israel Prize laureate Geula Cohen will deliver greetings to those attending the conference, and will remind all of us that the skies did not fall when she herself passed the Jerusalem and Golan Heights Law in the Knesset, nor will the skies fall when Israel will apply its sovereignty over Judea and Samaria. Edmond Levy committee member Adv. Alan Baker will present the main points of the Edmond Levy report.”

As regards the Edmond Levy report, Katsover and Matar mention the importance of the Israeli public assimilating its conclusions: “The leftward-biased Talia Sasson report gained recognition and legitimacy, while the report of Justice Edmond Levi is attacked for its presumed rightward bias. The Edmond Levy report must take its proper place in the public-governmental discourse, and action must be taken in accordance with it. Consequently, Adv. Baker’s words are of central importance in the approaching conference.”

Dr. Mordechai Kedar will speak on the expected response to this step from the direction of the Arabs, and a special panel will discuss the question that concerns many among the Israeli public, namely, the status of the Arabs after the application of sovereignty. Caroline Glick, senior editor at the Jerusalem Post and Latma editor, Prof. Aryeh Eldad, Adv. Elyakim Haetzni, and Dr. Martin Sherman will participate in the panel, which will be moderated by Eran Bar-Tal, economics editor at Maariv.

In the artistic part of the conference, Karni Eldad will provide musical accompaniment, and the Latma team will present a video skit produced especially for the conference.

On the importance of the application of sovereignty, Katsover and Matar say: “The reality in which territory in Eretz Israel remains without clear political status leaves options open in the eyes of the Arabs, and also for the Europeans, the Americans, and the rest of the world. New plans for how to get rid of the heart of the Promised Land pop up all the time. Forty-five years after the fact, action must be taken, to apply Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria, and to put a stop to the humiliating buying and selling of the heart of our homeland.”

The two estimate that the storm that the application of sovereignty will arouse in the world will be much smaller than the hurricane expected by those apprehensive of the move. “Upon the application of sovereignty, after the protests by the world’s hypocrites, the situation will return to normal. The Arabs, of course, will go through the motions of ‘non-acceptance,’ but deep in their hearts they know that Israeli rule is the best for them, economically, medically, educationally, etc.”

Regarding the venue chosen for the conference, the Bible Lands Museum, after the two preceding conferences had been held in Hebron, Katsover and Matar state that the choice was not by chance: “This is an unequivocal statement: Eretz Israel belongs to the people of Israel according to the Bible.”

Katsover and Matar tell of the great interest concerning the event and the many questions directed to them, mainly questions of feasibility and practical questions about the application of sovereignty. For them, this is a most necessary and logical step: “While, a decade and a half ago, talk about the Oslo Accords and a Palestinian state as an Israeli diplomatic goal was accepted, we now can see the sharp turnabout that has occurred among the Israeli public. This is evident both in the results of the recent primaries, and in the current polls in advance of the coming election. The people in Israel has sobered up from the illusions of the left, and chooses to return to Eretz Israel and to nationalism. When this is the discourse that is on the rise, there is also a growing understanding among the people that only actual possession of and sovereignty over the entire land will bring security, and at the end of the day, also peace from strength.”

For more information:

Yehudit Katsover – 050-7161818, Nadia Matar – 050-5500834

The Movement for Israel’s Tomorrow (Women in Green)