November 2002

Contents

The social wars

United States: energy and strategy *

Al-Qaida's elusive money men *

Indonesia: the fear factor

Syria: a blight on the Damascus spring *

Balkans: the road to nowhere *

Corridor access *

Spain: al-Andalus revived *

Côte d'Ivoire: north v south *

Chile: no future without a past

Russian roulette in Cuba *

The despair of having everything *

Fenced off in France *

The imperial high style *

Welcome to our new edition

would you like to read more?
subscribe now

search the site:

to receive our free monthly summaries, please fill in your e-mail address

A NEW 360km security wall is being built by Israel around the West Bank and Jerusalem, and it will radically change both the geographical and political landscape of the Middle East. By putting up a wall that is three times the length and twice the height of the Berlin Wall, Israel will unilaterally annex a substantial part of the West Bank and tighten military cordons around Palestinian population centres, effectively imprisoning their residents.

A security wall was originally established in Gaza during the first intifada (1987-1993) when Israel enclosed it behind a sealed electrical fence. This fence allowed Israel to control its 16 settlements in the Gaza Strip, as well as all Palestinian movement. Today Israel still controls about 50% of Gaza, and 1.2m Palestinians remain confined to an area less than twice the size of the city of Washington DC.

Building a wall around the West Bank means that the Palestinians living there will soon share a similar fate to those Palestinians who live in Gaza. The first stage of the wall will separate most of the northern West Bank from Israel. This wall is being built inside the 1967 Armistice line, annexing many settlements, surrounding several key Palestinian areas and dissecting others. Palestinian areas, such as Qaffin, will be deprived of 60% of their agricultural land, while other areas, such as Qalqiliya, will be both deprived of land and be cut off from the West Bank and Israel.

The wall in these areas is costing Israel over a million dollars for every kilometre: it is fortified with eight metre-high cement walls, and guard towers every 300m with a two metre-deep trench, barbed wire and a security road.

The first stage of this northern wall will run almost 100km from Salem to Kufr Kassem and will mean annexing 1.6% of the West Bank, including 11 illegal Israeli settlements and over 10,000 Palestinians. Israel intends to incorporate this area into Israel in such a way that, when the final status negotiations resume, the cost of reversing these actions will be so high they will be considered irreversible. This means that the wall is an Israeli strategy to move the Green Line.

The wall is most damaging to Palestinians in the Jerusalem area. In the north Israel has limited its extension of the wall into the West Bank to no more than 8km deep at any one point, but in Jerusalem the wall goes far deeper. This difference between the northern wall and that around Jerusalem reflects a different Israeli logic. Judging Israel's aspirations by its proposals made at Camp David (July 2000) and Taba (January 2001), it will want to keep those urban settlements in the north that currently lie outside the wall. That means the wall in the north does not, as stated repeatedly by the prime minister, Ariel Sharon, and his then defence minister, Binyamin Ben Eliezer, represent a political border. But the wall being built around Jerusalem incorporates most of Israel's interests and does represent a real political boundary.

To consolidate control over the Greater Jerusalem area, Israel is currently focusing most of its settlement building there. In the plan for enveloping Jerusalem, which was authorised by Sharon earlier this year, the first stage of the wall will include all of Jerusalem, as defined by Israel after it annexed East Jerusalem in 1967, as well as the two large Israeli settlement blocs of Givon and Adumim, which are outside the annexed area.

This incorporation of Greater Jerusalem into Israel poses major and irreconcilable security and demographic problems for Israel, since it involves a large number of Palestinians. To resolve the problem, Israel is trying to build two walls around Jerusalem. The first is an inner wall, built primarily around the (Israeli-defined) municipal boundaries. The second wall will be an outer wall around the settlement blocs. Unlike the medieval fortress-like construction in the north, these "walls" will be built with electric wire fencing and a security road, at points combined with trenches, cement walls and motion detectors. The two walls are like a necklace, as the security wall will act as a thread to connect existing Israeli settlements and military sites. These settlements and military sites already have security cordons around them. So the wall simply links the settlements together, and consolidates Israeli control over the empty space between them.

Israel is at present focusing on building walls to separate Israeli areas from Palestinian population centres. To the north, a wall cuts across Qalandia airport to separate Jerusalem from Ramallah. To the east, a cement wall along the Mount of Olives separates the Palestinian areas of Abu Dis and Azzaria from Jerusalem. To the south, a wall and trench have already been built to separate Bethlehem from Jerusalem and also to annex much of its remaining municipal land. This includes annexing Rachel's Tomb, a Jewish and Muslim holy site deep inside Bethlehem, which is flanked by two Palestinian refugee camps.

'What we build today, we will keep tomorrow'

Encouraged by the lack of international condemnation of these actions and eager not to have any part of Israeli-defined Jerusalem divided, the mayor of Jerusalem, Ehud Olmert, is also moving to build a wall around Kufr Aqab and the Qalandia refugee camp, in the northern tip of municipal Jerusalem. Palestinian residents in this area carry Jerusalem residency cards and pay Israeli taxes, but receive no Israeli municipal services. Instead they are stopped from entering Jerusalem by the Qalandia checkpoint. But Olmert is moving to build another wall to cut these areas off from the West Bank, locking the residents into a prison.

When the wall from the northern West Bank to Jerusalem is completed, Israel will have annexed over 7% of the West Bank, as well as 39 illegal Israeli settlements with 270,000 settlers, and also 290,000 Palestinians; 70,000 of these do not have Israeli residency and so have no right to travel or get services from Israel, although Israel is depriving them of their livelihoods in the West Bank. These Palestinians are extremely vulnerable and will probably be gradually forced to emigrate from these areas. If the wall continues south to Hebron, Israel will then annex another 3% of the West Bank.

Israel is building the wall and expanding its settlements with the logic of "what we build today, we will keep tomorrow". Actions like settlement construction are contrary to international law, including dozens of UN resolutions, but there is no mechanism to stop such actions. And as settlements expand and consolidate they will become increasingly difficult and costly to remove. The negotiation parameter established by President Bill Clinton that "what is Jewish in Jerusalem is Israeli and what is Arab is Palestinian" is likely to remain as the parameter for future negotiations.

The international community seems to have united behind the Middle East Quartet (1) vision of re-starting final status negotiations in three to five years, but little thought has been given to what of the Palestinian state will be left to be negotiated. The Palestinian position is being undermined as the wall will deprive Palestinians of 10% of their territory in the West Bank and Israeli settlements all over the occupied territories will expand.

As in Gaza, Israel may be able to build a wall around the West Bank that prevents the movement of Palestinians and keeps control over its settlements. But as the events of the past two years show, walls built by force will not bring security either for Palestinians or for Israelis.

If negotiations are to have a chance to resume and if the framework of a two-state solution is to remain, the international community must not only freeze settlements, but actually encourage the evacuation of settlers from the occupied territories. Such a policy cannot be dependent on pre-conditions or on a cease-fire. Settlements and the construction of the wall pose a real and imminent risk to peace in the region and to the framework of the peace process, with its goal of establishing two viable states.

* Researcher at Orient House in Jerusalem; he has acted as political adviser to the Palestinians on Jerusalem

(1) The United States, Russia, the European Union and United Nations.