The Israeli Settler Movement Post-Oslo

If Israel's settlers suffered a setback in their grand strategy when the Likud government was voted out of office in June 1992, this paled compared to the blow they received in September 1993 when the government of Yitzhak Rabin recognized the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and signed the Declaration of Principles (DOP) on a Palestinian self-governing authority in the occupied territories. Suddenly, the icy winds of reality blew through the cozy network of politics and infrastructure thsettlers had been building since the mid-1970s, and the national consensus they had, rightly or wrongly, taken for granted over their presence in the occupied territories seemed in doubt. Settlers faced their greatest challenge, but thanks to their work of previous years, they were ready for it.

Peter Shaw-Smith is a Jerusalem-based free-lance journalist.