Jerusalem - Israel police and paramilitary police demolished
two unauthorized settlement outposts in the southern West Bank early
Wednesday morning, but settlers vowed to rebuild them.
When the dismantling forces arrived at an outpost outside the
settlement town of Kiryat Arba, adjacent to Hebron, in the pre-dawn
hours Wednesday, they found only one large tent filled with
equipment.
According to Israel Army Radio, the outpost had been dismantled in
the past, but rebuilt.
At the second outpost, also outside Kiryat Arba, police found five
youths who did not resist when they were taken away and their two
make shift huts and equipment were confiscated.
One of the outposts' founders, Tzur Natan, told Army Radio that
settlers 'will continue, continue to settle' the occupied West Bank
and set up more outposts.
'At these very moments, a new building is being built,' he said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Ehud Barak
on Sunday said they would remove the outposts, which settlers had
built without government sanction.
Some 100 outposts, set up independently by Jewish settlers without
formal government approval, are scattered throughout the West Bank.
Of those, Barak said, 22 would be removed, if not through agreement
with settler leaders then by force.
Often consisting of little more than a few makeshift shelters,
the unauthorized outposts are located next to the 121 'formal'
Israeli settlements in the territory. All are considered illegal
under international law. Israel considers the formal settlements
legal, but not the outposts.
The 2003 'road map' authored by the quartet of Middle East peace
sponsors - the United States, Europe, United Nations and Russia -
calls on Israel to uproot all outposts erected since March 2001 and
to freeze all construction in the other settlements.
Previous attempts to evacuate outposts have not always gone
smoothly and in some cases have been met with violence on the part of
settlers. Settlers also often return to rebuild after removal forces
have left.
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