Word: shamir
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None of which necessarily means that a conference will meet anytime soon. At least one of Assad's motives was to put the onus of blocking peace squarely upon Israel, should Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's government balk at accepting the same terms. Shamir is alert to that danger, but he is far from avid for a peace conference...
Last month Baker responded to Shamir's latest snub by calling settlements the biggest "obstacle to peace." President Bush followed up by warning that he might withhold $10 billion in U.S. loan guarantees that Israel wants to help absorb Soviet Jews unless Jerusalem agrees to a settlement freeze. As usual, Shamir was unimpressed by the threats. Speaking at the West Bank settlement of Beit Arieh last week, he dismissed any connection to peace talks and vowed that the construction drive "cannot be stopped...
...well-calculated risk. Since 1968, the U.S. has criticized Israeli settlements while significantly increasing financial aid. Last week the House of Representatives overwhelmingly rejected an amendment to cut $82.5 million -- the amount the State Department estimates Israel spent last year on settlements -- from the annual $3 billion aid package. Shamir expects that Congress will be increasingly reluctant to tangle with Israel as attention turns to the 1992 elections...
...Shamir's insistence that Soviet Jews are not being directed to the territories is partly disingenuous. While free to choose where they live, poorer Soviet Jews as well as native Israelis are being lured to the territories by special tax breaks and heavily subsidized mortgages. "We'd like to live somewhere else, but we can't afford to," says Boris Gamov, who emigrated from Moldavia seven months ago with his wife Ulga, and now rents a three-room caravan in a Gaza settlement for $40 a month. "We simply have no choice...
Israeli hawks contend that the settlements actually help the peace process by putting pressure on the Arabs while making Jews feel more secure. Palestinians see the continuing land confiscations and de facto annexation as proof that Israel does not intend to make any compromises. Whether Shamir can keep altering the status quo in Israel's favor without paying any price depends almost entirely on Washington. So far, Shamir appears unconvinced that Bush has to be taken seriously...