Subduing Al-Quds: Israel’s High-stake Game in Al-Aqsa and Why Netanyahu May Prevail

• “But to change the status of Haram al-Sharif, which has been an exclusive Muslim site for the last 1,300 years, much blood would have to be spilled. That, too, is being managed by Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has successfully pursued the country’s Attorney General to permit the use of sniper fire against protesting Palestinian youth. … The fact that plans to conquer even the remaining symbols of Palestinian nationhood and spirituality have finally reached al-Aqsa is particularly alarming. .., Netanyahu is likely to push forward with his plan, no matter the price or the consequences.” – Quote
  –
• Emphasis mine:
• Subduing Al-Quds: Israel’s High-stake Game in Al-Aqsa and Why Netanyahu May Prevail
  by Ramzy Baroud, http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/, September 25, 2015 
  The current violence against Palestinian worshippers at al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem is a logical extension of early Zionist ambitions.
  –
  The State of Israel was established on the ruins of Palestine, based on a series of objectives that were initialed by letters from the Hebrew alphabet, the consequences of which continue to guide Israeli strategies to this day. The current violence against Palestinian worshippers at al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem is a logical extension of the same Zionist ambition.
  –
  Plan A (February, 1945), Plan B (May, 1947) and Plan C (November, 1947) all strove to achieve the same end: the ethnic cleansing of Palestine of its original inhabitants. It was not until March 1948 that Plan Dalet (Hebrew for Plan D) brought together all of the preparatory stages for final implementation.
  –
  Championed by the Haganah Jewish militias, “Plan Dalet” saw the destruction of hundreds of villages, the depopulation of entire cities and the defense of the new country’s borders, ensuring Palestinian refugees are never allowed back. For Palestinians, that phase of their history is known as the “Nakba”, or the “Catastrophe”.
  –
  “Dalet” was an astounding success from the Zionists’ viewpoint. However, the borders were never truly defined—in order to allow for territorial expansion, at the opportune time. That moment came when Israel launched its war of 1967 (known to Palestinians as “Naksa” or the “Setback”), seizing East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza, and thus sealing the fate of the entirety of historic Palestine.
  –
  Occupied Jerusalem was not open for negotiations: it is Israel’s historic, eternal and undivided capital, they claimed, citing or misinterpreting biblical references as they saw fit. Almost immediately, the Israeli Government annexed Jerusalem by extending the West Jerusalem municipal borders to include newly conquered East Jerusalem.
  –
  It was not until 1980 when Israel passed a law that explicitly annexed the illegally occupied city to become part of the so-called Israel proper.
  –
  Since then, Jerusalem has been a major point of strife, political conflict and controversy. Understandably, the Jerusalem political discourse is conflated with discussion about religion, but it is far more encompassing than a conflict over access to holy sites.
  –
  The fate of Jerusalem and its holy sites cannot be understood separately from the fate of Palestine. And the daily struggle of Palestinian Muslims and Christians in that City is a representation of the struggle of Palestinians everywhere.
  –
  As West Jerusalem was conquered under “Plan Dalet”, East Jerusalem, like the rest of the Occupied Territories was, along with other Palestinian regions, the target of another plan: The “Allon Plan”.
  –
  It was named after Yigal Allon, a former general and minister in the Israeli Government, who took on the task of drawing an Israeli vision for the newly conquered Palestinian Territories. While the Israeli Government moved to immediately change the status quo governing East Jerusalem, the “Allon Plan” sought to annex more than 30 percent of the West Bank and all of Gaza for “security purposes”.
  –
  It stipulated the establishment of a “security corridor” along the River Jordan, as well outside the “Green Line”, a one-sided Israeli demarcation of its borders with the West Bank. The plan envisioned the incorporation of all of the Gaza Strip into Israel, and was meant to return parts of the West Bank to Jordan as a first step toward implementing the “Jordanian option” for Palestinian refugees, i.e., ethnic cleansing, coupled with the creation of an “alternative homeland” for Palestinians.
  –
  While the plan did not fully actualize, the seizure, ethnic cleansing and annexation of occupied land was a resounding success. Moreover, the “Allon Plan” provided an unmistakable signal that the Labor Government, which ruled Israel at the time, had every intention of retaining large parts of the West Bank and all of Gaza, with no intention of honoring United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, which challenged Israel’s military takeover of Palestinian territories.
  –
  To ensure seizure of new land would be irreversible, the Labor Government needed to move some of its citizens (in violation of the Geneva Conventions) to the newly-occupied territories. Doing so required reaching out to the most reactionary, religious elements of Israeli society, the religious- ultra-nationalists camps, who were on the margins of mainstream politics.
  –
  read more.

end