The New York Times · 26 March 1970

CP-1970-020

Israel to Settle 1,000 Jews In Arab Town of Hebron

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JERUSALEM, March 25—The Israeli Government announced today that it would assist in the settlement of 250 Jewish families in Hebron, an Arab town in the occupied part of Jordan. Deputy Premier Yigal Allon, speaking in Parliament, said the Government would seek private investment as well as treasury funds to assist in housing and employment. Mr.

Allon, apparently anticipating the furor the decision would create in the Arab world and in some Western capitals, said it had no political significance for the future of the occupied West bank of the Jordan River. This view was challenged last night in a Labor party caucus when the decision was taken. Opposition also was heard today when Mr.

Allon announced the plan in Parliament. Opponents said Israel was losing all her options for peace by settling the occupied areas little by little. Others charged that the Government was being influenced by extremists. Mr. Allon said that the plan had nothing to do with a proposed Jewish suburb that had been the subject of an earlier debate.

Many observers believe that the establishment of an estimated 1,000 Jewish settlers in a major Arab urban area will be taken as indication of Israeli intentions to remain in the area. Mr. Allon may believe this to be the case, too.

He was reported on the state radio tonight as having said in the course of his announcement that time was having its effects in the area under Israeli administration. The proposed settlement will be the largest of the 31 civilian and paramilitary outposts established in the occupied areas or planned for this year.

All but a cluster of three in the Etzion area, between Hebron and Jerusalem, are border settlements. There will be 14 such settlements in the Syrian heights, seven in the Jordan valley, five in the northern Sinai and Gaza Strip, three in the Etzion bloc and one—Modiin in Israel—will be moved across the old Jordanian border.

It is understood that the new Hebron settlement will be on a hill over the city and next to a British-built police fort, now the headquarters of the military government and the residence of about 100 Jewish settlers who sought to live in Hebron shortly after the 1967 war. They moved into a hotel and then announced their intention to stay.

The Cabinet eventually decided to permit them to remain, but within the army compound. The hilltop location recalls the establishment of Upper Nazareth after the 1948 war. Jewish settlement was planned for the hills around the Arab town of Nazareth as a security measure, some thought then. Upper Nazareth has grown to contain thousands of Jewish families. Mr.

Allon spoke of the new Jewish community in Hebron, the home of 38,000 Arabs, as a continuation of Jewish settlement over thousands of years. He spoke also of other families settling in the area in the future. Hebron was said to have had a Jewish community since the return from the Babylonian exile in the sixth century B.C.

After the 16th century, it became one of the four holy cities of Palestine.

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