AFP | Jul 11, 2012 | JORDAN TIMES
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israeli President Shimon Peres has warned of the demographic consequences on Israel of ongoing settlement in the occupied West Bank.
“Israeli settlements in densely populated Arab areas could bring about a demographic change about which we would do well to think hard about before acting,” he said in remarks broadcast on both army radio and Israel public radio.
“Without a Jewish majority, it is doubtful whether a Jewish state can remain Jewish,” he warned during a ceremony held on Tuesday evening.
His remarks alluded to demographic consequences of a possible annexation of the West Bank, an issue which came up earlier this week with the publication of a report which found that Jews “have the legal right” to settle in the territory.
Projections show Israel is rapidly losing the “demographic battle” against the Palestinians who are set to outnumber Jews in the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean within a matter of years.
Official statistics show there are currently some 5.9 million Jews living in Israel and the occupied territories, compared with 5.8 million Palestinian Arabs: 1.6 million Arab Israelis, 2.6 million Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and 1.6 million in Gaza.
The report, written by three prominent Israeli jurists, rejected the idea that Israel was a “military occupying power” in the West Bank and said the establishment of settlements there “cannot be considered illegal” in conclusions which contradict international law.
The international community considers all settlements built in the West Bank and East Jerusalem to be illegal because they are built on territory Israel occupied during the 1967 war.
But Peres’ remarks sparked an angry response from Danny Dayan, head of the Yesha settlers council, who accused him of “once again violating the institution of the presidency” by expressing a political position.
“The Jews have a majority west of the Jordan River, that is to say in Israel and Judea and Samaria [the West Bank], and that majority has never been called into question,” he told army radio.
In Israel, the president’s role is largely ceremonial.
Of course Shimon Peres is right. By not agreeing to a 2-state solution the Israelis are digging their own grave of a Jewish State. To close their eyes to it will not change anything.
So far the Israelis have managed to make a some-kind-of balance by ‘importing’ millions of ‘pseudo Jews’ from Russia and Ethiopia and at the same time trying their utmost to expel Arabs. Who knows where ‘all of a sudden’ they will discover some ‘hidden Jews’ that they could bring in.
All these efforts however, as present demographics show, will not be sufficient.
Soon Israel/Palestine will have an Arab majority. Let a real Democracy follow. (Unfortunately in the ‘real (Arab) democracy’ the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’at situation may be worse than at present, but that is another story).