In his post, he mentions that Israeli settlements in the West Bank are actually legal. Maybe they are. Yet, it's irrelevant whether they're legal or not. That can be argued à la Monty Python and that would be extremely pointless. The real question is: what is the point of the settlements? Vanillaman's answer: defense of Israel. But, these settlements have existed ever since Israel took over the West Bank in 1967. These settlements have done nothing but enrage Palestinians and rightly so until they turned hostile. If the settlement's weren't there, maybe there would be more chance for peace.
These settlements are counterproductive and could make Israel lose an ally.
One more argument for an independent Palestine
My last argument for an independent Palestine is the survival of Israel itself. In a short amount of time, the number of Palestinians living under Israeli control (Gaza, West Bank and Israel) will be greater than the number of Jews living in Israel. There will be a choice to make. Maclean's magazine explains it better than me, so I will quote my favourite parts here as it is a long article.
Their country will either be Jewish, but not democratic — in other words, a Jewish minority will control a land mostly inhabited by Palestinians — or Israel will be democratic, but not Jewish, because Arabs will form the majority in what will become a bi-national state.
[...] Still, the consequences of Israel's victory — namely the settlement of occupied territories — have frustrated prospects for peace in the decades since. And now, with Israel perhaps irreversibly entangled in the West Bank, these same fruits of victory threaten Israel's future as well.
[...] Matar is opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state and believes Israel must annex the West Bank and Gaza. When she is asked how Israel could continue to exist as a Jewish state if Muslim Arabs were the majority, she looks genuinely surprised by the question. "I'm not going to give them voting rights," she says.
[...] Our road home skirts the Israeli security barrier. It has been credited with dramatically decreasing the number of terrorist attacks inside Israel, though Palestinians decry it as a land grab because much of it runs inside the West Bank, essentially attaching territory captured in 1967 to the rest of Israel. Mohamed doesn't think the wall has much to do with security because, he says, he's able to cross it at will.
[...] Most Israelis favour a two-state solution.Israel's diverse political landscape, which results in perpetually fragile governing coalitions, makes it difficult for politicians to move this agenda ahead, even when there is a genuine will.Read more at Maclean's.
