We Should Give Texas Back To Mexico

Rick Santorum on Israeli Settlements in Judea and Samarea

Digital Journal 

Republican Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum, in a campaign stop in Iowa on Friday, said there are no Palestinians in the West Bank, only Israelis. According to Rick Santorum, all people "who live in the West Bank are Israelis."

Reuters reports the former Pennsylvania Senator told a participant at an Iowa campaign event that "All the people who live in the West Bank are Israelis, they're not Palestinians."

Rick Santorum defended his statement by comparing the status of people in the West Bank with the status of people in New Mexico and Texas, both being territories the U.S. won in wars, even as Israel won the West Bank territory in war. According to Santorum, the Israelis have a right to build settlements in the West Bank because the West Bank is ground "gained during war" following "an aggressive attack."

Rick Santorum concluded:

"The bottom line is that West Bank is legitimately Israeli country. And they have a right to do within their country just like we have a right to do within our country. If they want to negotiate with Israelis, and all the people who live in the West Bank are Israelis, they’re not Palestinians. There is no ‘Palestinian.’ This is Israeli land.”

Rick Santorum also said that all Iranian nuclear scientists are enemy combatants, implying that the U.S. has the right to target them for assassination. According to Santorum:

"Nuclear scientists who work on this program, particularly if they come from foreign countries into that, they will be seen as enemy combatants. They will be people who are threats to the United States just like your garden variety terrorist."

Reuters points out, significantly, that Santorum did not explain whether the "Israelis" who live in the West Bank should be accorded equal citizenship rights with all other Israelis.

Rick Santorum is known for his extreme views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and on Iran. The Jerusalem Post reports that on November 10, Santorum said about Iran:

"A country that is developing a weapon of mass destruction to use it or destroy another country must be stopped in a preemptive strike."

Rick Santorum performed poorly in the last Gallup Poll.

Vengeance is Mine, Thus Sayeth the Settlers

Israeli settlers attack shop of freed Palestinian prisoner in Hebron

Haaretz

Hani Jaber, who had been serving a life sentence for stabbing a Kiryat Arba yeshiva student, was one of hundreds of Palestinians released from Israeli jails in exchange for IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.

Dozens of Israeli settlers attacked a shop in the West Bank belonging to a Palestinian man freed as part of a prisoner swap deal last month, locals said Sunday.

The settlers threw objects and rocks at the shop in Hebron, according to Palestinian residents. Police intervened in clashes that

broke out after the incident between Jewish settlers and Palestinian residents, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told DPA.

No one was reported injured in the clash that came as thousands of Jews arrived in Hebron to celebrate the Sabbath on Saturday.

An Israeli woman and a Palestinian man were questioned but later released, Rosenfeld said.

The owner of the shop, Hani Jaber, had been serving life in an Israeli prison for stabbing to death a student from a Jewish religious seminary in the nearby Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba in 1993.

A radical Jewish group has vowed revenge for his release and put up posters offering a price on his life.

Some Israeli Jews have condemned the prisoner exchange, under which Israel freed hundreds of jailed Palestinian militants in exchange for Gilad Shalit, the IDF soldier held captive in Gaza for over five years.

About 800 Jewish settlers, protected by a heavy Israeli military presence, live in Hebron's historic centre, among tens of thousands of Palestinians. The city was divided into Israeli- and Palestinian-controlled sectors under a 1997 agreement.

Israeli settlers attack shop of freed Palestinian prisoner in Hebron Hani Jaber, who had been serving a life sentence for stabbing a Kiryat Arba yeshiva student, was one of hundreds of Palestinians released from Israeli jails in exchange for IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.