Premier Yitzhak Rabin assured settlers in the Jordan valley that they were there to stay and could count on the government to strengthen and extend Israeli settlements in that area of the West Bank adjacent to the Jordan River. He gave his assurances to representatives from 17 Jordan valley settlements who met with him at Moshav Bikot this week as Arabs were demonstrating in other parts of the West Bank against Jewish settlement.
Rabin said the government did not establish settlements with the idea of abandoning them and that he considered the Jordan River to be Israel’s permanent security boundary in the east. The Premier conceded that it would require sizeable funds to put the Jordan valley settlements on a firm basis and that other settlement projects on the Golan Heights, the Raffah salient and the Judaean hills were competing for funds. But the government will make the maximum effort to advance settlement in the Jordan valley, Rabin told the settlers.
He sought to banish their apprehensions over the future. When asked if they should plant olive trees which take 7-8 years to bear fruit, Rabin replied, keep planting. A representative of the Housing Ministry who accompanied him on the tour told the settlers of plans for five more settlements to be established in the Jordan valley this year at a cost of IL 150 million.
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