Why Israeli settlements don’t feel like a conflict zone | Settlements Part II

That's me driving to a licensed outpost deep in the West Bank. This is disputed land I'm driving through. And when I got to the outpost I expected the family I was meeting to throw a bunch of ideology at me and a lecture about how Jews deserve this land more than Palestinians. Instead, we played music, ate food from their land, and talked more about the advantages of living in the desert. Close to Jerusalem, the best view, the best weather, close to my parents. Excellent. It is perfect. These people don't have weapons. They don't close their doors. I visited 15

settlements

to find out what motivated the people on the front lines of one of the world's longest and most difficult

conflict

s.

The West Bank is home to 2.2 million Arabs and is considered

part

of a future Palestinian state by the international community, but there are now more than 400,000 Israeli settlers living here, about 5% of Israel's population. You can learn all about how they got here in the first

part

of this series. Many of the first Jewish settlers who came here in 1967 were driven by a strong ideology to claim this land for Israel. But things have changed quite a bit since then. If you spend ten minutes in the

settlements

today, sometimes you'll

feel

like you could easily be in a New Jersey suburb.

We are here to play a game and have a good time. Clean roads, big houses, quality parks, good schools, nearby shops, a university. You ask people why they moved here and instead of the original mission of advancing the State of Israel, you hear things like... Great educational system. There is a very nice country club. We wanted to be in a bigger place. It's a great place to raise children. This is such a beautiful sight, it is our land and we love to look at it all the time. We were looking for a suburb of Jerusalem that we could afford and that was a manageable commute.

Close to Jerusalem... Extremely close to Jerusalem. The quality of life is much better. It has nothing to do with politics. Having a little more peace of mind. Most people here work in the city. Then you come back here at night or in the afternoon. And it's just relaxing and peaceful. Between the puppet show, the boisterous Bar Mitzah party, and a hundred other examples of seemingly ordinary suburban life, it's hard to remember that these settlers live on the brink of intense

conflict

. My wife and I had certain criteria. One was that we wanted to go out the back door and walk in 5 minutes.

There is still ideology here. Many residents of these communities

feel

connected to the settlers' original mission to relocate the hills of ancient Judea and Samaria, which they call... "The cradle of all our civilization." But ideological motivations for living here are usually 4 or 5 points down the list of priorities, with quality of life reasons being the main drivers. To find out if my ideological motivations were the main motivations for moving, I won't lie. That wasn't one of the most important things. I wasn't looking to make a statement. I was trying to find a place that was a good place, a safe place to raise our children, and this was the choice.

It wasn't one of the criteria at all, but it ended up being a real plus. Of course, the hard core of settlers who returned to the land still exists. Here I am with a boy who doesn't want his name or his face in my video. He lives in an outpost, illegal even for the Israeli government. There is no baseball league or bagel shop in his community. God promised us that this is our land. And we can grow here if we listen to it. This renegade culture of seizing hilltops once characterized the settlement movement. But now, the enthusiastic ideology that started the movement has been diluted by more practical factors such as housing prices and the quality of schools.

I think this real estate ad for a settlement community perfectly captures the combination of quality-of-life motivations with a touch of ideological fervor: "If you've always had a deep longing for Jerusalem, now is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. No only to be within its gates but to build your dream home there. The tranquility of a picturesque setting and fresh mountain air with all the benefits of Jerusalem is adjacent to the city of Givat Zeev and is connected to Jerusalem. There are two main roads, but make no mistake: there is still a conflict here. A land occupation that has a huge impact on the lives of Palestinians, but this seems to be the safest place in the world in many settlements it is so peaceful and. nice is that the government invests proportionately more public money in settlement communities than in communities in mainland Israel.

Settlement schools receive better funding than schools in mainland Israel in the form of better salaries for teachers and other teachers. benefits. Almost a third of all subsidized housing in Israel is located in the settlements, although only 5% of Israelis live there. In the past, the government implemented a mortgage subsidy program that made living here much cheaper than in mainland Israel. Things like public transportation are also cheaper for settlers than for mainland Israelis. An Israeli think tank found that the government spent about $950 on each West Bank resident in 2014, more than double what it spends on people living in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem.

The settlement enterprise has become a fixture of Israeli institutions and society, which helps explain why you don't have to be an ideological activist to want to live there. I can't hide the quality of life people enjoy here, okay? I can't hide the fact that people are moving from the United States from very luxurious homes and choosing to live in Efrat... And they don't suffer in Efrat. They are managing to maintain a similar quality of life. In addition to government support, many settlement gyms, theaters, and parks are funded in part by ideologically motivated American donors. So what you get are attractive communities that feel totally normal and livable, but are built with an ideological mission and have great political meaning.

Even unauthorized outposts that are illegal under Israeli law are supported by the government. Like this soldier provided by the government to protect the community, a playground built by the government, as well as a public waste and recycling collection, all in a location that the government considers illegal. My house was built by the government, that is a fact. These places are connected to public water and electricity services. They receive all the support despite not being authorized. We have everything here, from Internet to water and electricity. Like everywhere. But often, to appease the international community, the government still tries to appear tough on unauthorized settlements.

Outpost, my contact tells me that the authorities show up once a year or to tear down a settler's house and then take a picture of it to show the world that they don't allow illegal outposts. But in reality, they clearly do. There has been government support from parties on the right and left in Israeli politics, which have different reasons for supporting the settlements. And while this support is not the only or even the main reason why the settlements are growing, it has surely helped turn the settlers' experience into something positive. a normal, habitable and often pleasant situation.

The original mission of the settlement movement was to claim land deep in the West Bank, preventing a Palestinian state. Here are the Palestinian population centers and here are the settlements. Any proposal to give the Palestinians their own state must now take into account the hundreds of thousands of Israelis living deep in the West Bank. No one seriously considered that it was possible to expel the 400,000 inhabitants. And while negotiations are stalled, Israel continues to issue permits and settlements continue to grow. All these peace talks are like two guys negotiating over pizza, while one of them eats pizza.

Just a few weeks ago, the Minister of Housing announced that he foresees that this region here will go from seven thousand inhabitants to half a million in the next ten years. Israeli settlements are one of the issues most universally condemned by the international community. But no matter what you think of them, it's hard to imagine them going away anytime soon. What did you think I was living? Did you think he lived in some kind of tent? ride camels? What did you have in your imaginary image of the settlement movement? There are half a million people living here in solid houses.

Before 1996 there were only 100,000 Jews living on the other side of the Green Line. Today we are approaching half a million. And that number continues to grow. The Jewish people have returned home. That will not change. In this video I spoke with many settlers whose motivations were more practical than ideological. In the next video I will go to Jerusalem and talk to the settlers who are at the epicenter of the conflict. Colonists whose motivations are much more ideological. I also wanted to point out that I spoke with many American settlers. 15% of the settlers are Americans. I also talked to settlers from Holland, Russia and everywhere.

The West Bank is really full of settlers from all over the world.