Israeli arrogance is about to stoke dangerous levels of violence in occupied Jerusalem and the West Bank. Tel Aviv’s plan to build 1,000 new colony houses in occupied east Jerusalem has coincided with its decision to enforce a total closure of Al Haram Al Sharif, banning Muslim worshippers as well as Jewish radicals from entering the precinct.
When a mid-level United Nations official used a UN Security Council emergency session to warn that Israel’s plans for further colonies threaten the viability of the future Palestinian state, he was doing no more than accidently spelling out exactly what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is hoping will happen. The unwitting UN official may have meant his words to be a dire warning to the Israelis, but he was talking to a government that hates even the thought of a two-state solution.
In addition, the situation in occupied Jerusalem has become further inflamed by the Israeli crackdown, following the attempted killing of a Jewish extremist, Yehuda Glick, belonging to the ‘Temple Mount Faithful’, a radical group that seeks to rebuild a Jewish temple in Al Haram Al Sharif. It is a matter of grave regret that fanatics like Glick have the backing of Israeli nationalist extremists like members of parliament Moshe Feiglin and Miri Regev who have used their position to stoke far-right Israeli politics with the active connivance of Netanyahu’s administration. Together they seek to end any talk of the two-state solution while expanding Israeli ownership and domination of the entire West Bank.
So when UN political chief Jeffrey Feltman called on Israel “to rescind” its plan to build 1,000 new colony homes, which he said was in violation of international law and contrary to the goals of the two-state solution, he was saying nothing new. All he was doing was talking. Such rhetoric needs to trigger international action, which should begin with the US administration and European Union member states stopping normal contacts and not allowing the free flow of aid and trade to a government like Netanyahu’s that is dedicated to wrecking any hope of a negotiated solution and is encouraging violence in order to inflame the situation so that it can justify new security crackdowns and impose further brutality on Palestinians.
