What is the future of the settlements?
Throughout its history, Israel has accepted territorial compromise as the way to solve its disputes in the region, from its acceptance of the UN partition plan in 1947 to its acceptance of the land for peace formula set out in UN Security Council Resolution 242. Israel’s position today is that the future borders should be the subject of negotiation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Most Israelis expect that the most populous settlements, which sit on about 5% of the West Bank, will stay part of Israel. The Clinton Proposals, which followed the Camp David peace talks of 2000, proposed a deal whereby Israel would keep the larger and most populous settlement blocs which it considers vital for its security, and would transfer other territory from Israeli to Palestinian sovereignty in return. This principle of a land swap was also accepted in the unofficial 2003 Geneva Accords, which were negotiated by Israeli and Palestinian peace campaigners. Israel set a precedent for evacuat
