Expanding the West Bank settlements

From what I can tell the powers that be in Israel have no desire for peace whatsoever. Even as Bush's Secretary of State makes a long delayed and insufficient effort to re-start negotiations, the Israelis deliberately attempt to de-rail them by okaying new building in the West Bank. The Israeli powers want more land, not peace.

The goal of the initiative from Rice, who spent the past three days meeting with Israeli and Palestinian officials, is to move the two sides toward "final- status" issues, such as the shape of the new Palestinian state, the claims of Palestinian refugees to return to sites now in Israel and the fate of Jerusalem.

But, in a reminder of the difficulties that negotiators face, on the same day that Rice met with Olmert, the Israeli Housing Ministry announced plans to expand Maale Adumim, a large Jewish settlement in the West Bank just east of Jerusalem. The ministry plans to build 44 more units.

U.S. officials have protested continued building in the West Bank, but Israeli officials defended the decision. They said that it would not expand the perimeter of the settlement and that it was consistent with an agreement between Israelis and former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell that was reached before a U.S.-backed peace plan known as the "road map" called for a building freeze.

The problem with these settlement developments, as the Israeli's well know, is that they become faits accomplis that are difficult, if not impossible, to undo. Then, the negotiations, to the extent there are any, become whether Israel will surrender some useless patch of desert in the hinterlands in order to retain its settlements on Palestinians' land. Is it any wonder the Palestinians object?

Meanwhile, ignorant Americans sit back and say, "That's eminently fair. The Israelis are willing to give up as many acres of land as they have taken."