Nearly 200 such settlements are located strategically throughout the West Bank. Each has automatic weapons and an Army guard post. Even poverty-stricken Gaza, with 45 percent unemployment, has Israeli settlements covering a seventh of its area, lovely beachfront homes almost alongside squalid Palestinian refugee camps. Now, the Jewish peace organization, says the second quarter of this year showed a 51 percent increase in building starts. The military has drawn a crisscross pattern which cuts the West Bank into small parcels, allowing it, when it deems necessary, to cordon off Palestinian communities.
All movement is stopped, bringing the already feeble economy to a complete halt.
The population is mostly young. Hanging around without hope, resentful that the Oslo agreements have not brought them the promised improvements, and angry at Mr. Arafat's incompetent and corrupt government, they are open to extremists who preach violence. Their example is the Hizbullah in Lebanon, who fought the Israeli Army into withdrawal. There is no reason to think this would happen on the West Bank. Mr. Peres told Arafat of decisions taken in the Israeli Cabinet the day before which, he said, made him shudder.