Poreign Minister Moshe Dayan defended the autonomy plan to settlers on the West Bank and assured them that it will not affect significant changes in the status of Jewish settlements. Addressing a meeting at Tomer in the Jordan Valley north of Jericho last night, Dayan called for an increase in the number of settlements and the number of settlers. He said he “could not imagine” any future. Israeli government adopting a different police.
Dayan said that the Sinal pattern whereby Israel agreed to remove its settlements and settlers would not serve as a precedent for the West Bank because the status of the two areas is different. Sinal was under Egyptian sovereignty and now will revert to Egyptian sovereignty he said. He also observed that the Golon Heights were formerly under Syrian sovereignty, leading some observers to speculate that he was signaling a readiness by Israel to treat the Golon as it did Sinai.
But with respect to the West Bank, Dayan insisted that the status of the Jewish settlements would remain “the same as Nahalal or Degania” even after the “abolition of the military government.” The Camp David accords deliberately used the words “withdrawal of” with respect to the military government but Dayan blurred the distinction.
He stressed that autonomy was intended for the Arab villages and towns on the West Bank not the Jewish settlements. It is better for Israel to base its relations with the local Arabs on autonomy since the perpetuation of the military government is impractical and inadvisable, Dayan said. However, he cautioned that autonomy was only a transitional arrangement and after five years “borders and peace” will have to be negotiated between Israel and Jordan.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
