Barely a slowdown

What took place in the past few months is, in the best case scenario, not more than a negligible decrease in the number of housing units that were built in settlements.
By Dror Etkes
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/settlement-freeze-it-was-barely-a-slowdown-1.316074

The official statistics supplied by the Central Bureau of Statistics describe the story behind the 10-month construction moratorium in the West Bank. The story can be called many things but "freeze" is certainly not one of them. What took place in the past few months is, in the best case scenario, not more than a negligible decrease in the number of housing units that were built in settlements.

The data that appeared in the bureau's tables clearly show that. At the end of 2009, the number of housing units that were actively being built on all the settlements together amounted to 2,955. Three months later, at the end of March 2010, the number stood at 2,517. We are therefore talking about a drop of a little more than 400 housing units - some 16 percent of Israeli construction in the West Bank over that period.

The sounds of lamentation and wailing coming from the settler functionaries, for whom moaning is a profession, shouldn't surprise anyone. After all, they did not cease to whine even when Ehud Barak, "the leader of the peace camp," built 4,700 housing units for them in 2000, the only entire year he held the position of prime minister.

But the truth is that the settlers know better than anyone else that not only did construction in settlements continue over the last 10 months, and vigorously, but also that a relatively large part of the houses were built on settlements that lie east of the separation fence, such as Bracha, Itamar, Eli, Shilo, Maaleh Mikhmas, Maon, Carmel, Beit Haggai, Kiryat Arba, Mitzpeh Yeriho and others.



Jeff Halper interviews one Palestinian who is trying to hold on to his land despite the 'settlement' spread...

The real story behind the PR stunt known as the freeze took place in fact in the months prior to that, during which the settlers, with the assistance of the government, prepared well for the months of hibernation foisted upon them. In the half year that preceded the declaration of the freeze, which started at the end of November 2009, dozens of new building sites sprang up, especially in isolated and more extreme settlements east of the fence.