“In my view, Israel from the Mediterranean to the Jordan Valley is a Jewish state,” said Goldstein, 48, a mechanical engineer and air force veteran who is mayor of a group of settlements that form the Gush Etzion Regional Council.
December 28, 2007 7:38 am Settlers, Israeli-Palestinian conflict
“In my view, Israel from the Mediterranean to the Jordan Valley is a Jewish state,” said Shaul Goldstein, mayor of a group of settlements that form the Gush Etzion Regional Council, at his home in Neve Daniel.
(Ilan Mizrahi / For The Times)
Richard Boudreaux, A West Bank struggle rooted in land - Los Angeles Times, December 27, 2007
Goldstein is a tall, energetic and articulate defender of the settler movement and one of its more moderate leaders. He boasts of “very good relations” with his construction company’s Palestinian employees and most of his Palestinian neighbors, and says they must be accommodated in what he calls the land of Israel.
But he complains that his initiatives to cooperate with Palestinian village mayors on issues such as earthquake preparedness and water purification have been vetoed by the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah. He depicts the Nassar family’s legal battle, which blocks his settlement’s expansion, as an example of the same rejectionist stance.
“It is very difficult to make coexistence and civil relations with people who consider themselves part of a society that declared war against you,” Goldstein said.
Israel says it has a special claim to this part of the West Bank, dating to David’s biblical kingdom.