Sonja Karkar(Counterpunch);
"I srael's illegal settlement project and security policies are being pursued relentlessly and without interruption in the West Bank, despite the latest attempts to allow the Palestinian Authority (PA) to administer its own security arrangements as well as most civil Palestinian affairs.
The settlement project has devastatingly undermined the territorial basis for Palestinian self-governance established by the Oslo II accord of 1995 and gives Israel an excuse to intensify security which only adds to the unbearable day-to-day conditions endured by every Palestinian living under occupation.
The reality on the ground now is that the whole of the Palestinian West Bank is utterly fragmented: the Palestinians have been pushed into smaller and smaller sealed enclaves (about ten in all) while Jewish immigrants are being illegally settled on large tracts of Palestinian land which are then consolidated into even larger settlement blocs to allow for population growth – and all of them are connected to Israel by an exclusive by-pass road system.
These illegal settlements and the security that surrounds them divide and separate the Palestinian enclaves so that there is no contiguity between them. In this way, Israel can ensure that it controls Palestinian movement between the enclaves and also Palestinian access to the outside world.
Despite the seemingly amicable talks going on between Israel's Prime Minister Olmert and Palestinian President Abbas, Israel is not countenancing in the slightest ending the occupation or dismantling and removing the settlements and the matrix of control. Over the past decade, some 102 "illegal outposts" have been authorized by Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz. A cabinet-approved report by Israeli lawyer Talia Sasson in March 2005, strongly recommending the dismantling of the illegal outposts, changed nothing. Even the "settlement freeze" requirement in the Quartet's roadmap was blatantly ignored, and with every move, the international community accordingly adapted itself to accommodate Israel.
Consequently, Israel has not been reined in by the US and other Western governments for contravening international law and UN resolutions, and it therefore, has little reason to change its policies and practices. And now that the PA is in shambles - with Abbas in no position to negotiate anything of worth - Israel will simply be looking to consolidate its rule as it has always done. "
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