June 30, 2009

Report Criticizes Israeli Drone Strikes

Twenty-nine civilians, including eight children, were killed in several missile strikes by Israeli drones in Gaza in December and January, according to a report released on Tuesday by Human Rights Watch. The group questioned whether Israeli forces had taken “all feasible precautions” to avoid civilian casualties.

Lt. Col. Avital Leibovich, a spokeswoman for the Israeli military, said Israeli forces had gone to extraordinary lengths to warn civilians during the Gaza offensive, and she questioned the credibility of some of the Palestinian witnesses cited by the advocacy group.

The report represented the latest in a series of accusations of civilian abuse in the Gaza war. And it raised broader concerns about how carefully the remote-controlled drones are being used, much like the complaints that the Central Intelligence Agency has encountered in its use of drones to attack members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Pakistan.

The report was partly written by Marc Garlasco, the senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch who was a weapons-targeting official at the Pentagon from 1997 to 2003.

Mr. Garlasco has praised the American military’s use of drones in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying that their ability to hover over a target for many hours had improved the accuracy of many missile attacks and limited civilian casualties.

The group’s findings in Gaza suggest that “the weapon itself isn’t the problem,” he said in an interview. “It’s the way it’s used that is.”

He added: “The operators have the ability to distinguish between combatants and civilians and can even divert the missiles after launch. So it’s hard to understand how the Israelis did such a poor job of targeting.”

Mr. Garlasco said the report, which was released at a news conference in Jerusalem on Tuesday morning, was based on interviews with witnesses to six drone attacks and an examination of debris that suggested a standard drone-fired missile had been used.

The report said one missile had hit a group of university students who were waiting for a bus in the center of Gaza City, while another struck a truck hauling oxygen tanks, and a third smashed into a school sheltering people who had lost or left their homes.

In three other attacks, the report said, the victims were six children, ranging in age from 10 to 15, who were playing on rooftops in residential neighborhoods. Six other children were wounded. Muhammad al-Habbash, the father of one of the girls who was killed, told the human rights group that some of the children were feeding chickens that the family kept on the roof when the missile struck. At another house, Nahla ’Allaw said her son’s legs were crushed and blood poured from small holes in his chest as he died.

While fighters from Hamas, the militant Palestinian faction that controls Gaza, often placed artillery spotters on rooftops, these drone attacks took place early in the conflict before Israeli forces approached Gaza City’s central neighborhoods, the report said.

When asked about the rooftop attacks, Colonel Leibovich, the Israeli military spokeswoman, said, “This is the first time I am hearing of these specific incidents.”

The report said the attacks were a subset of the 42 drone strikes reported by Palestinian organizations, which estimated that as many as 87 civilians had been killed in them.

Israel has said that over all, 1,166 people were killed in the Gaza offensive. Of those, 295 were noncombatants, 709 were Hamas fighters and 162 were men whose affiliations could not be identified, Israeli officials have said.

Colonel Leibovich said Israel did not calculate how many people were killed by different weapons systems, like drones.

After the drone attack on the truck, the Israel Defense Forces released videotape contending that it had killed men who were loading rockets. The military later acknowledged that the cylinders on the truck were oxygen tanks. But the Israeli military still maintains that four of the men who were killed in the incident were Hamas operatives, an assertion that their families deny, the Human Rights Watch report said.

Colonel Leibovich said few military forces had ever taken as many precautions to minimize civilian casualties as Israel did in Gaza, dropping 500,000 leaflets warning people that its forces were arriving and even making telephone calls to neighbors of suspected Hamas fighters.

During the fighting in Gaza, “there were also numerous cases where pilots had to reverse the missiles because they saw civilians enter the area,” she said.

P. W. Singer, the author of a recent book on military robots called “Wired for War,” said Israel may also be finding that using the drones “certainly raises the bar of expectations.”

“Because you can target more precisely, people hold you to a higher standard,” he said.

In two Israeli settlements, a booming demand for more space

A stack of moving boxes packed with religious books is tucked into the corner of Yossi and Racheli Zehnwirth's apartment salon.

Three years ago, the couple arrived as newlyweds in this devoutly religious settlement – the second largest in the West Bank – with the hopes of buying their own home, a goal beyond reach 15 minutes away in Jerusalem.

Now, with two young boys, the family is moving to a rental half the size of their current apartment because they can't keep up with property values buoyed by high birthrates among ultra-Orthodox Jews and the demand from newcomers escaping overcrowded cities.

"Here we ride in bullet-proof buses for the price," says Mr. Zehnwirth. "Now we don't even have the [low] price any more."

As the Obama administration pushes for a total West Bank settlement freeze and Israel insists on allowing continued expansion inside existing settlements, Beitar and a second ultra-religious city, Modiin Illit, illustrate the roots of the dispute over Israeli development on land claimed by the Palestinians for a future state.

Planned by the Israeli government as a housing solution for religious sects with high birthrates and a preference for living in cloistered neighborhoods, building in the two settlements took off after the Oslo peace process began in 1993. Runaway growth has made the two cities account for one-fourth of the 300,000 Israelis spread over more than 100 settlements in the West Bank, not including Israeli neighborhoods of East Jerusalem.

But because these settlements are located relatively close to Israel proper, an agreement on a border modification and land swap is a realistic option for resolving the dispute here. Even though they have moved into the vortex of a decades-old geopolitical dispute, the residents of these communities are not nationalists like those at the forefront Jewish settler movement who seek territorial expansion.

"We didn't come here for politics or to fight. We want to live in the land of Israel, but it doesn't matter where – east or west," says Beitar Illit Mayor Meir Rubenstein. "To our great misfortune, the government put us here and now we're stuck with Obama."

Israel continues settlement expansion

The dispute over settlements has opened up the most public dispute between Israel and the US in about two decades. On Monday, Israel announced it had approved 50 new housing units in a settlement north of Jerusalem to accommodate settlers being moved from an outpost without government approval. In a policy speech earlier this month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that although Israel won't build new settlements, it will permit construction to allow existing communities to expand normally.

Last week, the G-8 and the Quartet of Peace process sponsors joined the call for a complete settlement freeze.

With rapid population growth, high demand for housing

Beitar Illit is about a 20-minute drive southwest of Jerusalem. The settlement looks out onto hilltops dotted by red-roofed houses that are part of the "Etzion bloc," a group of suburban settlements which left-wing Israeli governments have sought to annex in a land swap with Palestinians in previous negotiations.

The annual population growth in Beitar is nearly twice the overall rate of about 5 percent for the West Bank settlements. Mr. Rubenstein complained that Beitar Illit is planned to include 10,000 housing units, but there are permits for only 7,000 – the remainder are on hold until further notice.

Despite complaints among residents of Beitar Illit and other areas that the government isn't giving enough building permits, data published in March by the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics on housing starts in the West Bank showed a 42 percent increase in 2008 compared with 2007.

Peace groups complain that the population in the settlements increased about 50 percent in the last decade. Regarding the dilemma faced by the ultra-religious settlements, peace groups say that the government should encourage them to live inside Israel proper.

"Israel is constructing in a way that they limit the ability of Palestinians to use their own land," says Dror Etkes, a settlement expert at the human rights watchdog Yesh Din. "I grew up in Jerusalem and I cannot afford to live there even if I wanted. Who in the country has a guarantee they'll be able to live five minutes from their home? Only the settlers are asking for this."

Religious groups take refuge from modernity in settlements

Because strictly religious Jewish groups seek to block out trappings of modernity, they prefer to live in closed communities where advertising is tailored to their sensibilities and cable or satellite TV infrastructure is banned. Combined with the fact that Beitar Illit and Modiin Illit have the highest reproductive rate in the country of about eight children per woman, that has created surging demand for residential units.

Despite the slump in real estate prices around the world, values in Beitar Illit are climbing. Fraida Sterka, a local broker, said that prices have gone up 5 percent in the last two months.

"People want to live in a place that's very observant without any outside influences," says Ms. Sterka. "There's an entire community that wants to live here. There is a shortage of several thousand housing units a year."

To make do, owners are outfitting basements as apartments and closing in balconies for extra room. Because of a lack of commercial real estate in Beitar, shops have opened up in apartment buildings.

And so, in a couple of days, the Zehnwirths will move into a converted basement with one tiny window that opens into an air shaft and a second that looks out to a stairway landing.

"It's like living in a bomb shelter," says Mr. Zehnwirth. "The government promised us apartments here. They said, come and it will free up. Meanwhile, its only gotten worse."

The PA Financial Crisis: Causes and Implications

Eighteen months have passed since the Paris donor conference, where members of the international community promised the Palestinian government $1.45 billion in assistance for its 2009 budget. The Palestinian Authority (PA), however, has received less than a quarter of this amount, and Arab governments in particular have fallen short, contributing only $78 million of the $600 million pledged. Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayad has been forced to borrow $530 million from local banks this year in order to pay the salaries of PA employees, who with their families constitute one-quarter of the Palestinian population. When combined with the loss of internal revenue from the Gaza Strip since the Hamas takeover and the continuing Israeli restrictions on West Bank movement, the failure of donors to live up to their commitments threatens the tenuous economic progress the PA has made to date.

The Current Financial Crisis

The PA's 2009 budget of approximately $3 billion expects $1.63 billion of internal revenue and $1.45 billion of external funding (including $300 million approved at the March Sharm al-Sheikh conference for Gaza reconstruction). To meet its $250 million monthly budgetary needs, the PA relies on international donors for $120 million of this total. According to its own financial reports, the PA received a total of $328 million in external financing in the first five months of this year, far short of the $600 million it required.

To cover the deficit, the PA is borrowing from private banks and drawing on excess 2008 donor aid. The record $1.76 billion of external financing in 2008 exceeded the PA's expected budgetary support by $130 million. The European Commission was the largest donor last year, providing $651 million, while the United States was the largest individual donor nation, contributing $302 million. Arab countries gave $526 million and the World Bank granted $283 million. The 2008 donor commitment allowed the PA to cover its $1.12 billion deficit and ensure regular payments to PA employees, repayment of all wages in arrears ($317 million), private sector loans ($70 million), and some of its commercial banks loans ($29 million).

Reasons for the Current Budget Deficit

Three major developments have contributed to the current PA budget deficit:

Lack of Arab government commitment to the PA budget. While international donors pledged an impressive $7.7 billion at the November 2007 Paris conference and $4.2 billion at the March 2009 Sharm al-Sheikh conference to rebuild Gaza and support the PA budget, the lack of follow-through this year by Arab governments has left the Fayad government in a precarious position.

The miniscule contributions by Arab governments are particularly troubling when compared to their bold promises made at the 2007 Paris conference when Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, and Qatar together promised $400 million in annual budget support between 2008 and 2010. As of June 15, only Algeria, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE had delivered their share -- a total of $78 million -- of the promised aid for 2009. While Arab states contend they are withholding aid in order to pressure the Palestinian factions into forming a unity government, this approach is unrealistic and counterproductive. The Ramallah-based PA government is already spending almost half of its budget on Gaza. If the PA is forced to curtail spending on Gaza, this would only intensify the division between the West Bank and Gaza, making reconciliation more difficult.

The loss of Gaza revenue. Although Fayad's budget performance in 2008 was impressive, the Hamas takeover of Gaza has narrowed the tax base from which the PA is able to draw revenue. While 2008 saw overall revenues exceed budget targets due to increased economic activity in the West Bank and Fayad's administrative reforms, the PA draws revenue only from the West Bank -- there is no real income from Gaza. Indeed, while taxes collected by Israel on behalf of the PA increased in 2008 by 6.2 percent over 2007, this percentage conceals a much higher increase in the West Bank and a sharp decline in Gaza. In the West Bank, there was a 20 percent increase in value added taxes (VAT) on goods sold by Israel, and a 10 percent increase in petroleum purchases, but Gaza witnessed a sharp decline in receipts with a drop of 65 percent in VAT and 7 percent in petroleum purchases. Hamas, on the other hand, is able to raise funds in Gaza by collecting taxes and various domestic fees and by smuggling commercial goods (in addition to arms) through hundreds of tunnels under the Egyptian border. According to Tor Wennesland, the Norwegian representative in the Palestinian territories, Hamas runs nearly 1,000 tunnels (400 of which are officially approved), allowing the Islamist group to generate revenue to pay the salaries of its own employees and security forces while preventing the PA from collecting taxes on goods that would otherwise come through Israel.

Israeli restrictions on movement. In addition to cash donations, countries also promised to take on various development-related projects in the West Bank. In 2008, donor-financed expenditures on large infrastructure projects were estimated at about $190 million, less than half the $492 million commitment detailed in the Palestinian Reform and Development Plan of 2008. Cumbersome Israeli restrictions on movement resulted in frequent delays in projects and some cancellations. According to a June 8 World Bank report, "Israel's system of security has weakened the growth of the Palestinian economy and increased the dependence on the public sector." Restrictions on internal movement and goods transfers (import/export) have hampered efforts to build a developed economy and have made the Palestinian public heavily dependent on the government; the PA is now responsible for 145,000 employees whose salaries constitute 45 percent of the total budget. While the PA has tried to invest in small community projects that are less vulnerable to Israeli movement restrictions -- water sanitation, irrigation projects, electrifying villages or rural road paving -- these smaller initiatives do not have the economic impact of the larger infrastructure projects.

Conclusion

While Fayad's achievements are numerous -- improving law and order in the West Bank, creating a more favorable environment for local and foreign investment, reducing the back payments owed on salaries, enhancing the collection of domestic revenues, and reducing dependence on external donors -- his government faces major economic obstacles. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the West Bank's gross domestic product grew by 2.3 percent in 2008, but the lower than expected level of international donor assistance and continuing movement restrictions in the West Bank make it unrealistic for the PA to reach its 2009 growth target of 5 percent. Spending on Gaza consumes almost half of the PA budget while Israeli restrictions on movement hampers economic development and makes the Palestinians more reliant on the public sector and international aid.

The failure of donor states to deliver on their pledges this year will weaken government confidence and threaten the PA's fragile financial stability. More importantly, it signals to the Palestinian public that its government lacks international support at a time when the PA is confronting Hamas, enforcing law and order, and implementing its security obligations under the Quartet's 2003 Roadmap peace initiative. This confrontation includes recent crackdowns on two Hamas cells in Qalqilya in early June and the killing of five Hamas Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades militants.

For Washington, U.S. special Middle East envoy George Mitchell should work with Israel to ease restrictions on Palestinian movement as security improves in the West Bank, and convince the Gulf Arab states to live up to their donor commitments.

West Bank settlers call tourists to the rescue

This year's cherry festival was a roaring success, drawing thousands of people who enjoyed grilled kosher sausages and right-wing ideology in the emblematic Gush Etzion settlement bloc.

A band belted out its stuff as clowns entertained the wee ones and families gorged themselves on the plump cherries of the Rosh Tzurim kibbutz, one of the communities in Gush Etzion, just south of Jerusalem.

Food stalls and other small businesses did brisk trade, but the fest was about more than just fun and money.

Local tourism authorities hope such events will help boost support for Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, which are seen as a major hurdle in peace efforts with the Palestinians and have come under increasing US pressure.

"The goal is to make people discover Eretz Israel," says organiser Yoram Bitane, using the Hebrew words for Land of Israel, favoured by right-wingers to describe not only present-day Israel but also the Palestinian territories to which they claim a divine right.

"We want to make Israelis who have a negative idea of settlements come here and see for themselves," says Bitane, whose PR company promotes several Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

"We want people to know what they're talking about when making decisions on whether to give away a part of the territory or not."

Bitane has no doubt what that decision should be.

"I am Israeli, Jewish and a believer. I live here, this is my house, my land. No discussion."

He is also convinced tourism is a perfect tool to draw support and believes that if Israel had done more to attract visitors to Gaza at the time, it would not have needed to pull out its troops and settlers from the Palestinian territory in 2005.

After all, even former US president Jimmy Carter admitted he could not imagine Gush Etzion would ever be handed over to Palestinians.

Carter stunned the settler community which had long hated him for his opposition to settlements and whom they consider as pro-Palestinian, when he made the comment during a visit earlier this month to the bloc of settlements just south of Jerusalem.

"One can only wonder what President (Barack) Obama would feel if he actually saw for himself, rather than rely on hearsay," says Allan Novetsky as he watches his grandchildren, perched high up trees, picking cherries.

Novetsky, who moved to Jerusalem from Chicago three years ago, says he regularly takes family trips to Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

"We treat the country as a whole. We want to show presence throughout the country."

He points out he never feels the need to carry a weapon on such trips.

"It's as safe as any street in New York, probably safer," he says. A few metres (yards) away, two soldiers, assault rifles slung over their shoulders, amble through the orchard, stopping every now and then to eat some cherries.

Late last year, the Yesha Council, the main settlers' organisation, launched a major drive to attract tourism under the motto: "Judea and Samaria, the story of every Jew."

The campaign aims at promoting not only tourism in the West Bank -- which most Israelis refer to as Judea and Samaria -- but also the concept that Jews have had a God-given right to the land since Biblical times.

More than 280,000 Israelis live in some 120 settlements that criss-cross the West Bank and that are generally off-limits to Palestinians.

The international community considers the settlements illegal. Israel rejects this, and its right-wing government has dismissed calls for a freeze of all construction activity.

Authorities did demolish a few shacks in tiny outposts that were set up without authorisation, but right-wing activists immediately started rebuilding and pledged to erect more wildcat settlements.

The outposts have drawn much controversy but also hundreds of tourists, most of them intent on showing solidarity.

"The aim is to bring as many Jews as possible to the region, so they can see up close the type of danger that people face," says Tomer Tzanani, who runs outpost tours in an armoured bus twice a month.

Asked what Palestinians thought of the tours, Tzanani admitted: "I have no idea. We never come into contact with them."

Many settlers are convinced the Palestinians are the intruders in the West Bank, not the Jews.

The land of the Jews, says Bitane, "is not just this small bit they want to give us, but the whole of Greater Israel."

That he says includes the Golan Heights, which Israel seized from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day War, when it also captured Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and the Sinai peninsula

"We need the Golan. People need it to spend their vacations," says Bitane as loudspeakers blare out James Brown's signature tune "I feel good".

PA: Hamas plotted attacks on West Bank officials

Hamas members planned attacks on Palestinian Authority (PA) officials in the West Bank on orders from Hamas leaders abroad and the group’s armed wing in Gaza, a senior official said on Monday.

At-Tayib Abdul Rahim, secretary-general of the Palestinian Presidency reveled the alleged plot at a news conference in Ramallah. He said the PA learned of the plans from interrogations of Hamas prisoners.

He said that a Hamas cell had planned the attack ahead of the 7 June deadline set by Egypt for an agreement between Hamas and Fatah.

Hamas has not yet responded to these charges.

“We learned that some Hamas affiliates were told to prepare to distribute sweets on 1 July at 2:00pm after attacks are completed,” Abdul Rahim asserted.

He said however that the security situation was under control and that all those who prepared to undertake attacks against PA officials would be arrested.

“These directives, and these intended attacks are aimed only at thwarting dialogue on 7 July, and that indicates Hamas is not ready to sign agreement in Cairo,” Abdul Rahim added. He threatened to reveal the details of these Hamas plans to the public if that would be a necessity.

Abdul Rahim also said that concerned Arab states’ leaders had been updated on the details of the newly revealed Hamas plots.

The Palestinian presidency secretary-general reiterated that Hamas security forces in the Gaza Strip had detained about 100 Fatah affiliates including members of the movement’s Revolutionary Council as well as regional leaders. He also mentioned that Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas gave directives to release 100 Hamas-affiliated detainees in the West Bank.

Editorial: The Gaza ghetto

THE report on life in Gaza just issued by the International Committee of the Red Cross six months after the brutal Israeli attacks which killed between 1,100 and 1,400 people makes bitter reading.

According to the ICRC, there has been almost no improvement since the Israelis stopped their brutal onslaught. The daily round of killing may have stopped but Gazans are still condemned to living in a war zone. It remains a bombsite. Even if they had the money to rebuild their shattered homes and lives, they cannot get hold of the equipment. The reopening of the Rafah checkpoint on the border with Egypt has slightly improved matters — some trucks with medical aid have got through but it is a tiny fraction of what is needed. Israel’s blockade of the strip remains devastatingly effective. Gaza is, as the ICRC report so horrifyingly points out, a state of despair. Imprisoned by the Israelis, still mourning the deaths of family and friends (there is hardly a family that did not lose someone), with woefully insufficient medical care, a destroyed economy, no hope of a job and living in what looks like an earthquake zone (the reports’ own words), there is a hopelessness that shocks.

A state of despair... facing, on the other side of the prison wires, a state of arrogance. For over 60 years now, the Israelis have treated the Palestinians with contempt and hatred. Time after time, the latter’s human rights are trampled over, their political aspirations crushed, UN resolutions ignored, international outrage scorned and efforts to mediate peace spurned.

It is not merely a state of arrogance, it is a state of insanity. The despair sown by the Israelis in Gaza breeds militancy and hatred. It breeds, too, a counter arrogance which displays itself in a refusal to countenance Palestinian-Israeli cohabitation, indeed to countenance anything other than Israel’s complete destruction.

The Israelis blockade Gaza to punish the Palestinians for electing Hamas and to force its supporters from firing rockets at Israeli towns and settlement; it does the exact opposite. It fuels hatred of Israel. It ensures the rockets continue. It pushes the Gazans into the rejectionists’ embrace and creates a breeding ground for a fresh generations of suicide bombers. Only a lunatic would claim that it is in Israel’s interests. The cycle of oppression and misery has to be broken if Israel is to have the security it claims it wants. As a first step, it has to lift the restrictions and allow Gaza to start working and living again. Israel can never live in peace while it grinds the Gazans into the dust, while it keeps the territory as one giant prison whose inmates are forced to live in misery and squalor and humiliated daily. Nor should it.

The only way forward is the two-state solution proposed by the then Crown Prince and now Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah and adopted by Arab states in 2002 and again revived at the Riyadh summit two years ago in which, in exchange for Israel’s withdrawal from all lands occupied in 1967, Arab states would recognize it. The whole world understands that, including the US; only the Israeli government baulks at the idea and consistently finds reasons to block it — which calls into question its claims it wants peace. It seems far more interested in wanting mastery — brutal mastery if necessary — over the Palestinians.

Gaza seems proof of that.

Fatah deputy reports progress in unity talks with Hamas

The head of the Fatah faction in the Palestinian parliament, Azzam al-Ahmed, said on Tuesday that significant progress has been made in Egyptian-mediated reconciliation talks with Hamas.

The Fatah deputy said that both sides have found common ground on key issues, including Hamas prisoners being held in Palestinian Authority prisons, Palestinian elections, as well as the make-up of the armed force that is likely to be deployed in the Gaza Strip.

Both sides are currently discussing a deal whereby 75 percent of parliament members would be elected via party lists while the remaining 25 percent would be subject to regional polls.

Hamas and Fatah are also believed to be in agreement that the Gaza force would number 3,000 armed personnel. In addition, both the Fatah-run governments in the West Bank and the Hamas regime in Gaza would continue to rule while a joint committee is formed to administer the rehabilitation of the Strip and preparations for elections.

Israel opposes Egypt's proposal of a Palestinian unity government because it allows Hamas to be part of the Palestinian leadership.

Israel is holding talks with Egypt on a new cease-fire agreement in Gaza - the negotiations revolve around an Egyptian proposal within a broader effort to reconcile the two main Palestinian factions, Fatah and Hamas.

Another plank in the broader agreement being discussed is the reopening of the crossings to the Gaza Strip, on the border with Sinai and Israel.

US 'optimistic' ahead of Barak-Mitchell meeting

Will the Barak-Mitchell meeting manage to relieve some of the tension between Israel and the United States? The White House has expressed its optimism over the chances of making progress during Tuesday's meeting between Defense Minister Ehud Barak and special US envoy George Mitchell, which will be held in New York.

Barak was sent by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to meet with Mitchell in a bid to reach an understanding with the Obama administration about continuing construction in West Bank settlement for natural growth purposes.

White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs refused on Monday night to address reports that the Israeli government has decided to allow construction for natural growth needs, alongside the willingness to agree to a complete freeze for a period of several months.

"I don't want to get ahead of some very important meetings tomorrow between Ehud Barak and George Mitchell, except to say that we're optimistic about making progress," he said.

The US State Department is aware of the criticism, including on the part of commentators and column writers, who say that Israel is being demanded to freeze settlements while the Palestinians and Arabs are sitting on the fence and doing nothing.

Barak met with Mitchell in New York at the beginning of the month for a meeting which lasted more than three hours, most of it face-to-face. This time Barak is expected to arrive with some of his advisors and with Netanyahu's representative, Attorney Yitzhak Molcho.

Barak hopes to reach an understanding with the Obama administration representative about necessary construction for natural growth within existing settlements. However, the winds blowing from the State Department indicate that the administration will insist on a complete freeze of construction.

'Both sides know what this means'

State Department Spokesman Ian Kelly clarified Monday night that stopping settlements was defined very clearly in the Road Map for Peace. "A freeze on all activity relating to settlements, including natural growth, is what it says in the Road Map," he said.

Kelly explained, "We've been working with all the parties to try and come up with an environment conducive to the resumption of negotiations."

He added that "both Israel and the Palestinians need to comply with their obligations under the Road Map, and both sides know exactly what that means. For the Palestinians, it means ending incitements to violence against Israel and demonstrating an ability to provide security. For Israel, it means: Stop the settlements, which is laid out very specifically in the Road Map."

Analysis: Diplomatic faux pas, or calculated message?

Israel has a thing with timing, particularly around important diplomatic meetings.

In January, 2007, for example, then-prime minister Ehud Olmert flew down to Sharm el-Sheikh for a meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Shortly before Olmert's plane took off, the IDF launched a rare daytime raid on downtown Ramallah in search of a terror suspect. Pictures of the raid - in which four people were killed and 20 wounded - were broadcast live on Al Jazeera. Needless to say, this was not constructive for the Olmert-Mubarak meeting.

On Monday, timing was again not taken into consideration with the Defense Ministry revealing in a court affidavit it had approved the construction of 50 homes in the West Bank settlement of Adam under a master plan for the Binyamin Region that includes the construction of 1,450 housing units.

The affidavit was filed just hours before Defense Minister Ehud Barak left for New York to meet with the US Special Envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell to discuss America's demand that Israel stop exactly what the Defense Ministry affidavit was approving - continued settlement construction.

There are two possibilities regarding the bad timing in this case. One option is that the court had simply set the date for filing the affidavit without taking any external factors into account. However, one could ask why the Defense Ministry, which knew early last week about Barak's meeting with Mitchell, didn't just ask the court for an extension - something the ministry often does in similar cases.

The second possibility is that the filing of the affidavit as Barak left for the US was done on purpose to send a message to the Obama administration that Israel does not plan to cave in completely to America's demand for a settlement freeze. The construction in Adam is meant to pave the way for the evacuation of the illegal settlement of Migron, which is in itself just as important to the US - if not more so, since the outpost was built on private Palestinian land.

Barak, according to some officials, plans to offer the Americans a three month freeze on construction but will claim Israel needs to allow natural growth to continue, particularly in the settlement blocs.

So while Barak is limited in what he can propose to Mitchell regarding the settlements, he does have some maneuvering room on the issue of freedom of movement in the West Bank, the transfer of security over Palestinian towns to the Palestinian Authority and the evacuation of illegal outposts.

In their meeting, Barak will present Mitchell with a list of the gestures Israel has made to the PA over the past 18 months, including the removal of 21 manned roadblocks in the West Bank. A year-and-a-half ago, there were 35 manned checkpoints. Today, there are 14. The IDF has also removed over 100 dirt mounds that had been placed on roads in the West Bank, effectively blocking Palestinian traffic.

However, according to the Americans there is a lot more that can be done.

According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), there are still 68 manned checkpoints throughout the West Bank, and an additional 24 "partial checkpoints" which are staffed, according to the agency, on an ad-hoc basis. In addition the checkpoints, OCHA claims that there are 521 obstacles in the West Bank - such as earth mounds - that block off Palestinian access to West Bank roads.

What was unique about OCHA's report was that it was the product of a first-of-its-kind joint survey of the West Bank roadblock situation by the UN and the IDF. The joint tour of the West Bank roadblocks was initiated by Col. Benny Shik, the IDF Central Command's chief engineering officer, who is responsible for dismantling the checkpoints.

The explanation for the discrepancy between the OCHA and IDF numbers has to do with the way one defines a checkpoint. The 14 that the IDF says it maintains in the West Bank are deep inside the territory and could potentially impact Palestinian movement even though they are not manned on a full-time basis.

After removing the 21 roadblocks over the past 18 months, a Palestinian can now travel from Jenin to Hebron without passing even one roadblock or undergoing even one inspection. While some roadblocks remain in the territory, the IDF says they don't have a major impact on Palestinian freedom of movement. At the same time, OC Central Command Maj.-Gen. Gadi Shamni is considering lifting some of the remaining checkpoints.

OCHA, on the other hand, includes unmanned checkpoints in its count. In addition, the OCHA number includes the crossings into Israel, since some of them are located just over the Green Line. The IDF does not count these since they are manned by the Border Police and do not impact Palestinian freedom of movement. There is also the question of OCHA's political motivations and whether its reports are objective. Israel doesn't think they are.

The motivation of both sides for conducting the joint tour, though, is clear. The IDF has an interest in getting the word out about the roadblocks it has lifted. At the same time, OCHA has the opportunity to obtain its information from the source, which is in this case the IDF.