Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has been quietly enforcing a de facto building freeze on all construction for Jews in Judea and Samaria and areas in Jerusalem claimed by the Palestinian Authority, Israeli media reported Tuesday.

The Prime Minister promised U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to curtail construction for Jews until mid-June to give PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas time to fulfill his condition for a return to face-to-face negotiations with Israel.

Army Radio reported that Prime Minister Netanyahu told Housing Minister Uri Ariel, who lives in  the Judea and is a senior member of the Jewish Home party, to suspend publishing tenders for 3,000 residential housing units, including those to advance plans and construction of homes in the E-1 area of Maaleh Adumim.

Ariel insisted there has been no building freeze but added that the Prime Minister has delayed progress for new building, and he referred reporters to the Prime Minister, who arrived in China Sunday for a six-day visit.

Netanyahu’s reported agreement to a five-week freeze, much shorter than the 10-month freeze announced in September 2010, might be a gamble that Kerry will not be able to convince Abbas to resume direct talks with Israel.

There have been no real discussions since the 2010 building freeze, which Abbas demanded before resuming negotiations and then refused because it did not include a freeze in eastern, southern and northern Jerusalem, and did not cover public building in Judea and Samaria.

The E-1 area has become red line for both Abbas and Netanyahu. Any building activity there would infuriate Abbas and win him more support to continue to place the Palestinian Authority on various United Agencies.

If Israel were to even offer a hint to surrender the area, the Jewish Home party would probably pull out of the coalition, and it is doubtful if Likud-Beiteinu would agree to continue to rule with a new coalition that would include the Labor party.

However, Israel desperately needs an approved government budget for this year, and any party that forces new elections without a budget is liable to be severely punished at the polls.

Someone is going to have to climb down from the limb.

If Abbas misses another opportunity to miss an opportunity and starts demanding more conditions, Kerry and Netanyahu can walk away from the tree and leave him hanging there.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Israel this week on a mission that promised no groundbreaking news. His aides called his Middle East excursion just a “listening tour,” and certainly not one featuring any new grand plans for peace.

True, it was relieving to hear the PA’s announcement just before the visit that it had agreed to put off suing Israel at the International Criminal Court on charges of “settlement building.” But though this decision was disguised as a “goodwill gesture” to Kerry, the PA likely does not have any real interest in endangering its standing with the United States and others by actually bringing Israel to court.

Most specifically, the PA leadership is concerned about possible Israeli plans to construct a new Jewish neighborhood in the area known as E-1, across the highway from Maaleh Adumim and just east of Jerusalem.

Israel, for its part, knows that developing E-1 is critical for its own existence. The new Jewish location will not only protect areas of Jewish eastern Jerusalem, but will also save the city of Maaleh Adumim (population: over 40,000) from becoming a Jewish enclave surrounded by PA-populated territory.

Though Israel suffered intense international criticism for its announced plans to build in E-1, Prime Minister Netanyahu has not taken actual steps to do so. In fact, he told his Cabinet months ago that he was not about to embark on actually “building” E-1 but would rather simply continue zoning and planning the neighborhood.

We at KeepJerusalem.org feel the continued lack of genuine progress in building E-1 is a danger to regional peace. The project was announced in response to the upgrading of the PA’s status in the UN, despite the unchanged PLO charter that still calls for Israel’s destruction. Failure to carry through on building E-1 thus encourages the PA populace to believe that its bid to destroy Israel is a realistic one.

In honor of Kerry’s visit to the region, the PA announced yet again its strange position regarding the resumption of negotiations with Israel. It stated that that it will not enter into such talks until Israel ceases all housing construction – not only in Judea and Samaria, but also in the areas of Jerusalem liberated in the Six-Day War, such as Ramat Eshkol, Gilo, Pisgat Ze’ev, and much more.

Almost unbelievably, the PLO also insists that it will not meet with Israeli negotiators until Israel releases all Arab terrorist prisoners imprisoned before the signing of the Oslo Accords. The PLO does not explain by what right it demands that convicted criminals, lawfully deemed to have murdered or maimed Israelis, or attempted to directly or indirectly murder or maim them, be freed from prison. A similar demand of any other country would be laughed out of town.

These demands were nixed by none other than President Obama. During his visit to Israel and neighboring countries two weeks ago, Obama said it would be pointless to set conditions simply for the holding of talks – for then what would the talks be about?

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In case there were any doubts regarding the lengths to which the Human Rights Council – a United Nations body – was willing to go to express its anti-Israel bias, note the following recommendation it made in its 22nd Session just over a month ago:

“Israel must…cease all settlement activities without preconditions. In addition it must immediately initiate a process of withdrawal of all settlers from the Occupied Palestinian Territories.” Note that the UN body is thus actually calling upon Israel to uproot, expel and resettle the hundreds of thousands of Jews living in Ramat Eshkol, N’vei Yaakov, the Old City of Jerusalem, Maaleh Adumim, Ariel, Kedumim, Beit El, and dozens of other locations.

In addition, by calling these areas “occupied’ and “Palestinian,” it is taking a very controversial and one-sided stand on a matter of intense dispute among scholars. “Occupied” implies that Israel conquered the lands from their sovereign government – but Jordan, which controlled Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem from 1949 to 1967, was far from sovereign. In fact, its rule over these areas was recognized by only two countries in the entire world: Great Britain and Pakistan. Even the Arab League did not approve of Jordan’s annexation of these areas.

Israeli police on Sunday removed Palestinian Authority protesters squatting on the “E-1” area of Maaleh Adumim, east of Jerusalem, with President Barack Obama safely out of the country.

The demonstrators camped out on the area just before President Obama arrived in Israel as show of their claim to the land, as well as all of Judea and Samaria and half of Jerusalem. In deference to the president’s visit, Israel ignored their presence until Sunday.

The government has announced that hundreds of new residential units will be built in the area, but the Obama administration, has expressed strong objections, arguing that additional construction for Jews would present facts on the grounds that in favor of Jewish sovereignty over the area. More than 40,000 Jews now live in Maaleh Adumim.

Early Friday morning, a group of some 200 Palestinians, supported by international activists, built a tent city in E1 area separating Ma’ale Adumim from Jerusalem, and announced the creation of the outpost “Bab al-Shams” (Gate of the Sun).

Civil Administration officials arrived in the area, and issued an order to remove this “fresh invasion” off the state-owned land. During the day, Friday, police prevented the entry of additional activists and senior PLO officials Saeb Erekat and Hanan Ashrawi.

“The soldiers treated us improperly and savagely before they forced us to go back to Ramallah,” Ashrawi told Ma’an.

A vehicle carrying Ashrawi and PA minister of social affairs, Majida al-Masri, was stopped and searched at a checkpoint, with soldiers preventing the officials from continuing to the E1 area, despite holding Jerusalem ID cards.

Ashrawi said earlier that she fully supported and encouraged non-violent popular resistance against Israeli occupation, praising the activists for their “creative” means of protecting Palestinian land.

Al-Masri also congratulated the activists for their actions, saying it provided an example which should be followed across the occupied West Bank.

“Establishing a Palestinian village on Palestinian land slated for confiscation by Israel for thousands of settlement units is a form of popular resistance to the Israeli occupation and land theft,” the PA official said.

“Bab al-Shams must be set up in all Palestinian districts, in Hebron, Bethlehem, Ramallah, Nablus, Tubas, the Jordan Valley, Salfit, Qalqiliya, Jenin, and Tulkarem. Organizers of such protests must receive support,” al-Masri added.

It was reported, however, that Mustafa Barghouti, member of the Palestinian “The Day After” committee, visited the outpost this morning.

Israel’s military has also prevented activists from neighboring areas access to the “protest village” since Friday.

“We only have our determination, and it will not be easy to expel us from our homes. We will use our experience and skills to remain on the land,” local activist Abdullah Abu Rahma told Ma’an.

Leading activist Salah al-Khawaja said that the group is determined to stay on the land. “This is Palestinian land, it is our right to build our villages on our land whenever we like. We will not accept displacement and we will stay,” he said.

Four Bedouin families from the area, claiming ownership of the land, petitioned the High Court to prevent the demolition.

The petition, filed by attorney Tawfiq Jabarin, states that “the tents were erected on private lands as part of a tourism project to attract tourists who wish to learn about the heritage of the Bedouin living in the area, and enjoy the desert Bedouin experience.”

According to the petition, the project is called “Albadia” and supposedly includes “a variety of fun activities to encourage familiarity with Bedouin Arab culture,” and that the “Initiative involves seasonal winter and spring period only.”

Following the petition, the High Court issued a temporary order staying the evacuation of the area as long as there are no security issues that require an urgent evacuation. The state, however, will appeal to the High Court tonight (Saturday) to cancel the stay order, and enable the evacuation of the outpost.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu ordered the closing of all access roads, and for now the area is declared a closed military zone.

The activists established the outpost in reaction to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to hasten the planning process of Mevaseret Adumim, the neighborhood that should be constructed in the E1 area, between Ma’aleh Adumim and Jerusalem.

Netanyahu’s decision caused a wave of international condemnation and calls for Israel to change its mind.

The 10th day of the Hebrew month of Tevet, which fell out yesterday, commemorates an important precursor to the current siege that surrounds Jerusalem. Important, not because of the similarities between now and then but because of the refreshing opportunity implicit in the post-modern siege, both for Israel and for those who seek to impede its actions.

Regional conquest and domination were the obvious goals and the ultimate results of Nebuchadnezzar II‘s siege of Jerusalem on the Tenth of Tevet, 588 years B.C.E. Ancient Babylonia was building its empire and Jerusalem was not to stand in its way. To this day Jews the world over fast on the Tenth of Tevet, aligning their worldview with that of their biblical prophets who viewed the siege as a harbinger of the Temple’s destruction, the fall of Jerusalem and the Jewish exile. But must a siege always spell doom?

The odds were stacked against Jerusalem. Judea’s brethren in the northern kingdom of Samaria had long been overrun, exiled and dispersed. Clearly, the domineering Babylonians had the military advantage over the civilians within Jerusalem’s walls and the diplomatic edge over the Judean kings who were largely subservient to Babylonia. Once the siege was in full swing the only offense that could be offered was a strong defense. As time would tell, seasoned wellsprings of uncompromising leadership and inspired camaraderie had long dried up. If not Nebuchadnezzar II it would have been someone else. Jerusalem’s days were numbered.

A curious and historic role reversal has come to the fore in the wake of the international E-1 frenzy. Under normal circumstances, he who lays a siege is he who has the upper hand. But traditional sieges have always presented a clear and present danger to their victims. When the battlefield is replaced by press rooms and war is waged with windy condemnations, can the aggressor assume that he has a strategic advantage? Should he? And need the besieged party shudder at the thought of protracted belligerence?

Belabored, anticipated, thoughtless and knee-jerk attacks from EU countries regarding Israel’s decision to fortify its capital city awaken a true sense of sympathy for Europe’s impotence beyond its own borders. Berating Israeli diplomats adds some spice to the anti-Israel monotony, but photo ops are short lived and shifting the props on the set makes no impact on the ground. Indeed, the tragedy of fruitless attempts to impact the Middle East via mass media and open letters from Diaspora Rabbis to Israel’s Prime Minister lies not in the inefficacy of these failed approaches, but in the desperate delusion that they may actually make a difference.

Israel was infamously slow on the uptake when it came to identifying the sophisticated public relations war that it now faces on all sides. But it has become far more concerned about being forced  to live in bomb shelters than it is threatened by condescending statements by statesmen who care little for the survival of its sovereignty. Notwithstanding the multiplicity of narratives about what Israel was, is and will be, reality has a power all its own.

To date, Israel has emerged as the indisputable victor of the international diplomatic and propaganda siege that has befallen its capital city and, by extension, its people. On the foot-heels of Operation Pillar of Defense and on the eve of national elections, external pressure applied to Israel serves to strengthen the resolve of its people. Israelis have learned to live with international disdain for their very presence in the only country they can call home. Instead of apologetics, they engage in self-preservation. When Tel Aviv is hit by the same rockets that have consistently plagued Sderot, the people of Israel band together. There’s a reality on the ground and it will not yield to those who launch endless assaults from the world of ideas.

But is this a war that Israel wants to win? And if it is, then is this the way that Israel wants to win it?

Sure, the triumph of Zionism against relentless surrounding pressure is sweet. Yes, it’s difficult for Israelis to avoid a boost to their national ethos and ego following incessant efforts by their detractors to aggrandize the significance of the Jewish State by singling out the heinous crime of building homes while turning a blind eye to Syria’s gruesome civil war. But Israel has little to gain from its own self justification. And such an activity has even less to offer.

In many respects, today’s siege of Jerusalem amounts not to an undermining of its would-be fortifications but to a desperate cry for help from the international community. In a season when Western nations experience swift demographic overhauls, at a time when fiscal cliffs loom just around the bend and in a climate of nuclear proliferation among the world’s less predictable parties, somehow or other Israel grows increasingly stable. How does Israel survive in the Middle East? How does it manage to thrive?

In a benevolent and unwarranted attempt to judge the rhetoric of the international community favorably, we can attempt to attribute an optimistic angle to the world’s otherwise inexplicably disproportionate preoccupation with Israel. Perhaps, deep down inside, these nations want Israel to configure new algorithms for the benefit of humanity. After all, if Israel can save itself, then maybe it can save others as well. If Israel can generate a successful formula for coexistence with its Arab neighbors from without and from within, then maybe “peace on Earth” is not an empty slogan. If Israel can learn from the lessons of its past, then maybe the construction of Jerusalem will be viewed as a greater contribution to mankind than its destruction.

Jerusalem’s besiegers are a captive audience. It’s time for Israel to speak.

H/T Yisrael Medad. 

After New York Times‘ Jerusalem bureau chief Jodi Rudoren incorrectly reported that building in E-1 would make a “contiguous” Palestinian state impossible, the Times issued this lengthy correction to her article this past Sunday:

An article on Dec. 2 about Israel’s decision to move forward with planning and zoning for settlements in an area east of Jerusalem known as E1 described imprecisely the effect of such development on access to the cities of Ramallah and Bethlehem from Jerusalem, and on the West Bank. Development of E1 would limit access to Ramallah and Bethlehem, leaving narrow corridors far from the Old City and downtown Jerusalem; it would not completely cut off those cities from Jerusalem. It would also create a large block of Israeli settlements in the center of the West Bank; it would not divide the West Bank in two. And because of an editing error, the article referred incompletely to the possibility of a contiguous Palestinian state. Critics see E1 as a threat to the meaningful contiguity of such a state because it would leave some Palestinian areas connected by roads with few exits or by circuitous routes; the proposed development would not technically make a contiguous Palestinian state impossible. [Emphasis added].

Following the correction, former Bush adviser and fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations Elliot Abrams accused Rudoren of being completely bias when it comes to Israel, saying there was no other explanation for her failure to know or consult a map:

Here’s my theory: that just about everyone she knows –all her friends– believe these things, indeed know that they are true. Settlements are bad, the right-wing Israeli government is bad, new construction makes peace impossible and cuts the West Bank in half and destroys contiguity and means a Palestinian state is impossible. They just know it, it’s obvious, so why would you have to refer to a map, or talk to people who would tell you it’s all wrong? This was precisely what was feared when Ms. Rudoren was named the Times’s bureau chief: that she would move solely in a certain political and social milieu, the rough Israeli equivalent of the Upper West Side of Manhattan. This embarrassing episode–one story, many errors and corrections–may lead her to be more careful. One has to hope so, and to hope that both she and her editors reflect again on the thinking and the pattern of associations that lead a correspondent to misunderstand the issues so badly.

Yesterday, Politico posted part of an e-mail sent by Rudoren defending herself. She argued that she is not bias (of course) and blamed “imprecise language” on the pressures of making a deadline late at night. But that was not all. She went further, arguing that in essence she was and is correct about E-1 cutting Judea and Samaria in two, saying that’s “precisely why this area was chosen at this time” by the Israeli government. While as a writer and an attorney I can sympathize with the burdens of watching every single word while adhering to multiple deadlines for various pieces of work, her non-apology apology gives her bias away.

For years, Israel’s “friendly” critics have argued that Israel could establish a Palestinian state through various technical agreements and security arrangements, such as using bypass roads, which would theoretically enable Israelis to travel safely through certain areas of Judea and Samaria without worrying about road attacks. Even after the correction, Roduren assumes that such an arrangement would be impossible and goes even further by acting as if the territory in between Ma’aleh Adumim and the Dead Sea which would connect the top and bottom portions of Judea and Samaria does not exist.

My hope as a Jew and an Israeli citizen is that the government did choose to build in E-1 both to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state as well as to send a message that one could not be created about our consent. As I have written elsewhere, the timing indicates that this may be the case. But it could also be about other things: building in an area which all Israeli governments have viewed as being part of Israel in any future agreement with the Palestinians; sending a message to the Palestinians and/or the international community that Israel will take unilateral action in response to action taken by the Palestinians to change the status of the territory without Israel’s agreement (violating the Oslo Accords), or just building in a controversial area at what was thought to be strategically opportune time.

With the international community barely having finished expressing its outrage over Israel’s decision to build in E-1, between Jerusalem and Maaleh Adumim (reported at length in last week’s column), two other similar decisions have been made that are sure to re-ignite the flames.

Israel’s urban planning committees have approved two additional large-scale building projects in Greater Jerusalem, i.e., areas liberated in the Six-Day War of 1967. A visitor from another century might wonder how Israel still manages to find itself on the defensive over such decisions, close to a half-century after returning en masse to its holy and historic capital.

The two decisions concern Ramat Shlomo, in northern Jerusalem, and Givat HaMatos, in the south. The former is a haredi community of 20,000 situated between Ramot to the west and the Arab neighborhood of Shuafat to the east. Its planned expansion has been a classic case of getting hit with the spoiled fish and having to eat it: Israel paid dearly in its relations with the United States when it originally announced the new construction there three years ago – precisely in the middle of an official visit to Israel by Vice President Joe Biden. Now, with no progress having been made on the project since, comes this new announcement on the final approval stage – and Israel will again be subjected to an international outcry.

The original plan called for 1,700 new housing units, but this number was pared down by the District Housing and Planning Committee to 1,500 after it heard objections from Shuafat residents.

On Tuesday, the same committee approved some 3,000 new units in southern Yerushalayim, between Gilo to the southwest, Beit Tsafafa (Arab) to the immediate north (where approximately a quarter of the apartments will be built), and Talpiot to the northeast.

The neighborhood to be developed is Givat HaMatos, or Airplane Hill. Its name memorializes the Jordanian downing of a two-engine Israel Air Force plane there during the Six-Day War; pilot Lt. Dan Givon was killed. In 1991 it was used to house hundreds of families of new Ethiopian Jewish immigrants. Currently, however, only a few remain, and the neighborhood has essentially become desolate.

It can now be expected, however, that within a few short years this forlorn area will go the way of the rest of the Land of Israel: From barren emptiness to blooming growth.

It is a matter of consensus that Jewish growth and expansion in neighborhoods such as Givat HaMatos and Ramat Shlomo are critical moves at this time, and will have a major effect on future arrangements with the Palestinian Authority and the Arabs in the Land of Israel. Aviv Tatarsky, spokesman for the Ir Amim group working on behalf of Arabs in Jerusalem, said, “The more massive is the Jewish construction in Jerusalem, the more complex and difficult it will be to divide the city and reach an arrangement with the Palestinians.”

Jerusalem City Councilman Yair Gabbai agrees, but from the other side: “Jewish building in Jerusalem is what will guarantee Israeli sovereignty throughout the city and the future of the young generation that will live here. We still need another 20,000 housing units, however.”

Among the Jewish-owned plots of land in Givat HaMatos is that of 82-year-old Yitzchak Herskovitz of Kiryat Arba. He fought in Israel’s courts for 18 (!) years to oust an Arab Bedouin clan of trespassers from his property. The squatters had run away from the Bethlehem area after a lethal feud with Arab neighbors, and their presence in Israel proper was illegal. With his tenacity, Herskovitz succeeded not only in redeeming the property from Arab occupation, but also in making it part of a new, thriving Jewish neighborhood. He is now seeking to develop the plot for the purpose of affordable housing for young couples.

More than 50,000 new housing units are planned for Jerusalem in the coming 20 years – and the lion’s share of them are to be built in the areas that were liberated during the Six-Day War. The trend indicates that neighborhoods such as Gilo, N’vei Yaakov, and Ramot – which some news media and others still call “settlements” – will not only remain under Israeli sovereignty under any arrangement, but will also become the locations of choice for future construction in Jerusalem.

Israel this week took an important step toward strengthening Jerusalem and preventing any chance of its future division.

Despite increasingly strident objections from the U.S., Europe and the Palestinians, the Jewish state is moving forward with plans to expand the capital’s Jewish population.

At a meeting of the District Building and Planning Committee, officials approved a proposal to construct 1,500 apartment units in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo.

Located in the northern part of the city, Ramat Shlomo is a critical link ensuring an unbroken and contiguous strip of Jewish-populated areas from Ramot to French Hill.

This will make it extremely difficult for Palestinian-controlled Ramallah to ever connect with the eastern part of Jerusalem, thereby reducing the chance that Israel’s capital can or will ever be divided.

Bordered on the north and east by the Arab-inhabited neighborhoods of Beit Hanina and Shuafat, Ramat Shlomo also provides a bulwark against any possible attempts to stretch Palestinian control further westward.

According to some reports, construction of the 1,500 new apartment units could begin as early as next year, though it will likely take longer.

To be sure, there are still various additional bureaucratic hurdles that stand in the way of the start of actual construction, and the authorities can at any time throw a wrench in the works should they decide to do so.

But Ramat Shlomo is of great strategic significance and anyone who loves Jerusalem and wants to ensure that it remains indivisible and under full Israeli control should rejoice over this latest development.

Now, if the name Ramat Shlomo sounds vaguely familiar, that is because it was at the center of a diplomatic storm that erupted back in March 2010, when a plan for its expansion was approved during a visit to Israel by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden.

Washington was furious, the Palestinians were chagrined, and the Israeli left cold not contain its anger. As a result, the project was put on hold for two and a half years, and is now once again being revived after the Palestinian Authority’s latest unilateral moves at the United Nations General Assembly.

Don’t be surprised if the headlines in coming days once again take Israel to task for this latest move. No doubt everyone from the State Department spokesman to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon to European Union officials are all busy at their word processors preparing the latest condemnation of the Jewish state for daring to build in its own capital.

When news of the plan was first publicized earlier this month, along with proposals to build in the E1 area between Jerusalem and Maaleh Adumim, the international community’s reaction was swift and stern.

Indeed, there is nowhere else in the world – not a single place! – that a tediously dull decision about housing construction made by bureaucrats would elicit so much international interest.

But we should not let the noise bother us one bit. However harsh the criticism might be, Israel has the right and the obligation to erect housing where it chooses, and it is no one else’s business or concern.

Our national interest is to put an end once and for all to the delusions of our foes that they can wrest Jerusalem from us or divide the city. The best way to do so is to rev up the bulldozers and build.

Israel needs to take steps to provide affordable housing in Jerusalem and meet the growing demand for apartments. Neighborhoods such as Ramat Shlomo provide just such an answer, and we should not let Mahmoud Abbas’s empty objections dictate our housing policy any longer.

Back in 2008, a large chorus of Americans adopted the slogan “Drill, Baby, Drill” to underline their support for greater petroleum exploration. It is time we embrace that motto and modify it slightly for our own purposes, and encourage the Israeli government to: “Build, Baby, Build!”

By doing so, we can ensure that this precious land remains ours forevermore.