Wednesday, November 12, 2003

U.N. Estimates Israeli Barrier Will Disrupt Lives of 600,000:
"The route for Israel's planned boundary barrier would put nearly 15 percent of West Bank land on the Israeli side and disrupt the lives of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, according to a United Nations report released Tuesday.

The report is based on calculations made after Israel presented its first detailed map of the barrier last month. Israeli officials questioned the accuracy of the report, by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, and said the government was still assessing how many Palestinians would be affected."


The barrier, which includes an electronic fence, concrete walls, trenches and other obstacles, is intended to block Palestinian attackers and is not a political border, Israel insists. It veers into the West Bank to protect Jewish settlements, Israel says.

But Palestinians say the path amounts to confiscation of land and sets a boundary as a matter of fact that would make it difficult to establish a viable Palestinian state.

The United Nations agency said the map released by Israel showed the barrier running more than 400 miles on a twisting route through the West Bank. It will totally surround 12 Palestinian communities, leaving residents able to leave only through gates controlled by Israeli security forces, the report said.

Only 11 percent of the barrier is to be built along the Green Line, the armistice line set at the end of the 1948-49 Arab-Israeli war.

The fence will put 14.5 percent of West Bank land on the Israeli side, the report said, adding, "This land, some of the most fertile in the West Bank, is currently the home for more than 274,000 Palestinians."

The agency made a rough estimate that an additional 400,000 Palestinians would be adversely affected. In some instances, the barrier is going up between Palestinian villages and nearby farmland. In many small Palestinian communities, employees and students must cross the barrier to reach larger cities and towns where they work or study.

David Shearer, head of the United Nations agency in Jerusalem, said the report was not intended "to make any sort of political point."

"We simply wanted to highlight the severe problems these people would face," he said.…

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/12/international/middleeast/12MIDE.html

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