Israel Announces More Settlement Expansion

Housing Minister: Two-State Solution Will Never Happen Anyhow

After the last several rounds of settlement expansions failed to kill the nascent peace talks with the Palestinians, Israel appears to be going for broke, announcing another 1,500 settlement expansion in East Jerusalem amid comments that this may just be the tip of the iceberg.

Housing Minister Uri Ariel insisted that the Israeli government will continue building settlements as it sees fit beyond the Green Line, insisting that there was no reason not to because the two-state solution is “unrealistic and will never happen.

Ariel made the comments during another settlement expansion construction in Leshern, saying “whoever thinks we can be forced to build only within the Auschwitz borders is wrong.”

The “Auschwitz borders” refer to Israel’s pre-1967 borders, and the term, popular with hawks, is based on the notion that unless Israel keeps its conquered territories the nation and all Jews everywhere would somehow be “doomed.”

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.