Settlements constant of Israeli policy

Israel’s expansion of settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories is a constant Zionists policy, says an American expert.

On Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would not extend a 10-month partial moratorium on new West Bank construction.

“The constant of Israeli and Zionist policy is to remove the Palestinian people from their land and from history,” Ralph Schoenman, author of Hidden History of Zionism, told Press TV on Thursday.

“And that is the process that [has] gone under the cover of a pacification project not a peace project,” the US expert added.

Netanyahu says the settlement issue is not a “substantial one,” therefore, Tel Aviv’s settlement constructions will not influence the direct talks between the Israelis and the Palestinian Authority (PA).

The PA, however, says it won’t resume talks with Tel Aviv without an extension of the building curbs.

“The existing settlements are not in any event affected by the so-called moratorium that is no longer in effect. That moratorium only applied to so-called new constructions but existing settlements … [remained] subject to expansion and to extension,” he went on to say.

The partial freeze expired on September 26, 2010.