Israel's Colonisation of Palestine Blocking Peace, Says Jimmy Carter

The former US president Jimmy Carter has described Israel’s "colonization of Palestine" through expanding Jewish settlements as the single greatest obstacle to a resolution of the conflict.

Mr Carter, 81, who negotiated the 1978 Camp David peace accord between Israel and Egypt, wrote in the Tel Aviv newspaper Haaretz yesterday that Israel’s actions doom any Palestinian state to a "dismal" future and will perpetuate violence across the Middle East. "The pre-eminent obstacle to peace is Israel’s colonization of Palestine," he wrote. "Israel’s occupation of Palestine has obstructed a comprehensive peace agreement in the Holy Land, regardless of whether Palestinians had no formalized government, one headed by Yasser Arafat or Mahmoud Abbas, or with Abbas as president and Hamas controlling the parliament and cabinet."

Mr Carter also questioned Israel’s commitment to the US-led "road map" peace process. "Israel has officially rejected its basic premises with patently unacceptable caveats and prerequisites," he said.

He said Israel was insincere at peace negotiations during the 1990s when it offered to withdraw only a small proportion of the 225,000 settlers living in the West Bank. "Their best official offer to the Palestinians was to withdraw 20% of them, leaving 180,000 [Israelis] in 209 settlements, covering about 5% of the occupied land," he said.

"The 5% figure is grossly misleading, with surrounding areas taken or earmarked for expansion, roadways joining settlements with each other and to Jerusalem, and wide arterial swaths providing water, sewage, electricity and communications. This intricate honeycomb divides the entire West Bank into multiple fragments, often uninhabitable or even unreachable."

This week the acting Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said that if he wins this month’s general election, as expected, he will annex the main settlement blocks that are home to about 80% of settlers.|

Mr. Carter said Israel’s unilateral pullout from the Gaza Strip had left it as a "non-viable economic and political entity" and that the future of the West Bank is "equally dismal".

"Especially troublesome is Israel’s construction of huge concrete dividing walls in populated areas and high fences in rural areas - located entirely on Palestinian territory and often with deep intrusions to encompass more land and settlements ...

"This will never be acceptable either to Palestinians or to the international community, and will inevitably precipitate increased tension and violence within Palestine, and stronger resentment and animosity from the Arab world against America, which will be held accountable for the plight of the Palestinians."

Hamas is expected to deliver a list of proposed cabinet ministers to the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, today after the once-dominant Fatah party said it would not join the new government. The prime minister designate, Ismail Haniyeh, told CBS television that he hoped one day to sign a peace agreement with Israel. But he said Hamas would renounce violence and recognize the Jewish state only when Israel recognized "a Palestinian state within the boundaries of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem".