WEST BANK: Jewish settlers look to strengthen their communities in the Israeli-occupied West Bank by opening their vineyards and organic farms to foreign tourists

Record ID: 561734

  • Title: WEST BANK: Jewish settlers look to strengthen their communities in the Israeli-occupied West Bank by opening their vineyards and organic farms to foreign tourists
  • Date: 24th June 2011
  • Summary: KEDUMIM, WEST BANK (FILE-DECEMBER 6, 2009) (ORIGINALLY 4:3) (REUTERS) JEWISH SETTLERS SCUFFLING WITH ISRAEL SECURITY AFTER TRYING TO STOP STATE INSPECTORS WHO CAME TO ENFORCE A 10-MONTH MORATORIUM TO WEST BANK SETTLEMENT CONSTRUCTION ISRAELI SECURITY GRABBING TWO WOMEN SETTLERS ISRAELI SECURITY SCUFFLING WITH SETTLER DONNING TRADITIONAL JEWISH PRAYER GARB MORE OF SCUFFLES CLOSE OF STATE ORDER TO STOP CONSTRUCTION
  • Embargoed: 9th July 2011 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: West bank, West bank
  • City:
  • Country: Palestinian Territories
  • Topics: Industry
  • Reuters ID: LVAZ8B7WZDWZO2D199OR52897FP
  • Story Text: Jewish settlers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank have opened their settlements' gates to foreign tourists and Israeli visitors, hoping it will strengthen their communities, built on land Palestinians seek for a state.
    A one-day tour, booked through a regional settler council, costs 50 U.S dollars. An additional 80 dollars secures an armoured vehicle that bullets can't penetrate.
    Palestinians, or "local Arabs", in the words of settlers who spoke to one group of visitors, are not on the itinerary.
    Wine-tasting in the small settlement of Rechelim was one of the tour highlights this week for a group of tourists from Belgium, France, the United States and the Indian Ocean island of Reunion. They enjoyed award-winning Cabernets and Merlots from the local Tura winery.
    Next came a visit to Havat Gilad, a settlement-outpost built without Israeli government authorisation.
    "We have love to the country," Ilana Shimon, who lives in Havat Gilad with 30 other families, told the curious tourists, who kept asking her questions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
    "Once people come here and touch the people, touch the magic and see the place, all the delegitimisation and demonisation that we suffer from disappears. And this is the best thing - to come and see. We are simple, good people, we love the land. What really unites us here is the deep connection to the land, to the country, to our forefathers," said Shimon.
    About 300,000 Jewish settlers live in the West Bank, occupied by Israel in a 1967 war and home to 2.5 million Palestinians. The World Court has ruled the settlements illegal.
    Though violence has mostly subsided since a 2000-2005 Palestinian uprising, clashes between settlers and Palestinians are not uncommon.
    The placid vista presented to the tourists include organic cheese farms and flourishing vineyards that produce boutique wines.
    Palestinians see a far different view: settlements they fear will deny them a viable state and an Israeli barrier cutting through the West Bank -- a project they condemn as a land grab and which Israel defends as a security necessity.
    One of the tour stops is Itamar settlement, where a couple and three of their children, one a three-month-old baby, were killed in March.
    Israel has charged two Palestinians with their murder.
    The drive through Itamar was followed by lunch at Givot Olam, an adjacent outpost.
    Following a rustic meal of organic goat's cheese, yogurt and eggs -- all farmed on the outpost -- Jacqueline Bergman from the Netherlands and John Lansford from the U.S gave their impressions of their hosts.
    "It is very difficult to communicate what you see because media tell other stories. So I will, I have made pictures and I hope through the pictures and my story and the experience I have that people will understand the real situation of this land," Bergman said.
    "We're here to support the settlers, the ones that often the world thinks they're the bad guys but to us we think they're the heroes, the heroes of the whole world, the heroes of Israel. And we want to be here to support and show them our love and to see how they live and also be with them," Lansford added.
    But Yariv Oppenhiemer of the "peace now" anti-settlement group told Reuters Television the West Bank tourism project was misleading.
    "I can imagine that the settler leaders are not taking the tourists to see the real West Bank problem and they are not speaking about the problematic situation in which Israel controls the West Bank. but doesn't give the settlers and the Palestinians the same rights. So you can come and see nature, you can come and see the Jewish communities, you can see the settlements but eventually, just to look at the tourist sites and not to look deeper to see exactly what is the West Bank and what isa the meaning of the occupation - this is actually misleading the people that are coming there," Oppenheimer said.
    According to the tourism department of the settlers' Samaria regional council, its efforts have paid off with the number of tourists rising to almost 100,000 in 2010 from 45,000 in 2008.
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