After the IDF's expulsion, the settlements will be abandoned to Arafat's rule. Among a list of scenarios, including the destruction of isolated settlements, we choose here two of the less grave options, on the ground that they enjoy the backing of international law as noted above.

1. The Disarming of Settlements and Individuals

It is completely unacceptable that armed citizens of a foreign state, who in any case are defined as "war criminals" in terms of the Fourth Geneva Convention, should exist within the territory of another sovereign entity. Hence the collection of weapons, both from the settlements' armories and from individuals, would be an entirely legal act, and accordingly will be carried out. In this state of affairs the settlements will have no capacity for self-defense, instead being subject to the mercies of the authorities of the Palestinian state.

2. The Cutting Off of Infrastructure

All of the infrastructure except for cellular telephones (and cellular communication, too, can be blocked), such as water, sewage, electricity, and access roads, will be within the sovereign territory and under the control of the Palestinian state, and will be cut off (whether permanently or haphazardly) so as to impel the residents to leave. One should also note here additional concerns such as food supply, transportation to school, health clinics, ambulance services, and so on.

To repeat, so long as wide-scale massacres are not carried out, the illegal status of the settlements and the designation of their residents as "war criminals" will justify the cutting off of infrastructure as a sanction that is imposed on violators of the law. This will provide the Israeli government (any government) with a convenient pretext for its failure to intervene on its citizens' behalf. In this situation, however, a further question will confront Israel, namely: will it in fact be able to use the IDF to defend its citizens trapped in the Palestinian state?

Military intervention on Israel's part, that is, a military invasion of a sovereign state, would amount to a declaration of war. Considering that at this point the Palestinian state will enjoy the military backing of the states of the League with Egypt and Syria at the helm, what this means is large-scale war. Taking into account the inferiority in military balance from which Israel suffers vis-a-vis its enemies, and the geostrategic circumstances, it is hardly conceivable that Israel would incur an existential risk for the sake of "settlers".

The cost of civilian and military withdrawal from the Golan Heights has been estimated in sums of $30- $58 billion. Of this the civilian part, that is, the evacuation of 17,000 settlers, has been estimated at $15-$17 billion. Since these sums, which amount to half of Israel's gross national product, are well beyond its capacity, the finance minister, Avraham Shohat, has requested them from the U.S. government. However, it is not the president who decides on the provision of sums of such magnitude but Congress. The attempt to present these sums before the Congress in Washington was not only completely rebuffed but aroused great anger about Israeli chutzpah (a considerable portion of the members of Congress and the Senate regard Israel's readiness to hand over the Golan Heights to Damascus, and the territories of Yesha to Arafat, as both suicidal and contrary to American interests in the Middle East).

There is, then, no external party that is prepared to finance Israel's withdrawal from the Golan, let alone the evacuation of the population of Yesha, which is twelve times larger than that of the Golan. The two sums that are required to compensate a population of over 200,000 persons add up to approximately Israel's annual gross national product. The payment of even part of this total would cause an economic crisis incomparably graver than the one that occurred in the early 1980s, which brought inflation in the hundreds of percentage points, with the evacuation of the Sinai, the loss of oil, the building of alternative airfields, and the payment of compensation to the evacuees.

One of the issues discussed for a number of years among the Israeli "peace camp," and recently between the Barak government and the Palestinian Authority, is that of financial compensation to the Arab refugees from the 1948 War for Independence. The flooding of the state of Israel with millions of refugees, as stipulated by UN Resolution 194, which enjoins Israel to return the refugees to their homes, will bring about the end of the Jewish state. One of the alternatives being considered is the payment of compensation.

The cheapest way to do this, economically speaking, is to hand the settlements over to the government of Palestine. An assessment that was done on this issue asserts that the settlements' infrastructure and houses together are capable of absorbing half a million refugees. With such a measure (which will probably be called a "humanitarian gesture" by Israel to the Palestinians) Israel hopes to ward off the threat of the implementation of UN Resolution 194. The fact that this hope has no basis, and will only lead to an escalation in the Arabs' demands, as experience proves, is secondary to our concerns. One way or another, the Israeli government will portray this matter to the public as a historic achievement of rectifying past injustices on the way to the longed-for reconcili-

August-September 2000               - 5 -               Outpost