Settlers to hold two marches against Palestinian state

“We want to create an Independence Day atmosphere, pass a clear message to the world that ‘Israel is here,'" regional council head says.

By TOVAH LAZAROFF
man walks by protest signs in Migron_311 (photo credit: Tovah Lazaroff)
man walks by protest signs in Migron_311
(photo credit: Tovah Lazaroff)
Settlers plan to conduct two marches in support of continued Jewish settlement in the West Bank on Tuesday, in advance of the Palestinian unilateral statehood bid at the United Nations later this week.
At 5 p.m. settlers and right-wing activists plan to march from the area of the Beit El settlement to Route 60 in the Binyamin Region.
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Separately, at the same time, in the Samaria Region, settlers will march in the direction of Nablus from the home of the Fogel home in the Itamar settlement, where five family members were murdered by Palestinian terrorists earlier this year.
The council and citizens’ committee in both regions are also handing out Israeli flags to motorists and hanging flags off the side of the roads.
“We want to create an Independence Day atmosphere to strengthen the residents and to pass a clear message to the world that ‘Israel is here.’”
“There is nothing more beautiful or strengthening than to hang the nation’s flag along major access routes that both residents of Judea and Samaria and Arabs drive along,” said Binyamin Regional Council head Avi Ro’eh.
“In addition, we want to show that the Israeli nation is the master of this house, and it has flags and symbols that it can wave when it sees fit,” said Ro’eh.
Samaria Regional Council head Gershon Mesika said that at a time when the Palestinians are rejecting any kind of Jewish presence in Judea and Samaria, it was crucial to express Israeli sovereignty over the area.
Still, he said, he was not overly concerned about the Palestinian statehood bid at the United Nations.
“Most of the decisions the UN has taken in the last decades were against the State of Israel,” he said. Most of the world understands that the Palestinians have an automatic majority at the United Nations, he said.
Separately, the Council of Jewish Communities of Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip published photographs of major Israeli cities taken from a lookout point in the Beit Aryeh settlement, to highlight the security risk of returning to the pre-1967 lines on its internet site, My Israel.
Although the IDF, the Border Police and settler security officials have been preparing for Palestinian demonstrations which could turn violent in Area C this week, at present there is no information regarding any planned major activities.
“The IDF is estimating that little will happen outside of the Palestinian cities,” said Shlomo Vaknin, who is in charge of security for the Council of Jewish Communities of Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip.
Still, he said, preparations are in place for the worst case scenario.
Left-wing activists and Palestinians, in turn, are preparing for violence by extremist settlers and or right-wing activists, particularly in light of a number of “price tag” attacks against Palestinians mosques and vehicles earlier this month.
On Monday the grass roots Palestinian group, the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee, plans to create a volunteer patrol to respond to settler attacks.
Volunteer teams of Palestinians, Israelis and international volunteers will respond to reports of attacks, document them and intervene if possible.