Actually, there is really no need for settlement in the US or other countries, all that is needed is good will, let me elaborate. Gaza and the West bank are really too small to support a "Palestnian state" and they will soon run into a major problem of shortage of water. Thus sooner or later, it will be necessary to desalinate water in very large quantities. Well if that is the case, why not start with that premise, water desalination on a grand scale to support in the future a population of some 6 to 10 MM people. Where do you ask, very simple, Gaza is about 100 square miles, much too densely populated. On the other hand, The Sinai peninsula "belongs" to Egypt, but is empty (I doubt that the whole Sinai has 10,000 people, maybe 50,000. Make an agreement with Egypt to sell to Palestine a small strip of land (not even 5% of the Sinai) about 50 miles by 40 miles (or 2000 square miles, 20 times larger than the Gaza strip. Build five major desalination plants on the northern shore , enough to provide for both drinking water and agriculture (most of that land is flat till the cross Sinai highway, about 25-30 miles inland, and quite fertile if water was abundant). Provide generous lending terms and get Saudi Arabia and others to invest in agriculture and advanced manufacturing and 20 years later, you will have a big Singapore flourishing in the middle of the ME rather then the sordid conditions reigning there now.
But it belongs to Egypt? That is where goodwill comes, buy or lease it from Egypt (maybe a permanent .5% tax on NGP from that area, maybe a federation with Egypt, whatever, it is only 5% of the Sinai and barely .5% of Egypt's total sovereign area). Egypt and Saudi Arabia, will actually be great benefactors since the technology developed to make water desalination cost effective can solve major development problems these two countries are faced with. I am sure the Israeli, in exchange for true peace and such a deal, would love to grant them a royalty free license to the technology.
People will not be "forced" to move there. In the first three years, maybe only 500,000 people will be involved (building infrastructure, housing desalination plants etc.). This nucleus will act as a magnet to other starving Palestinians, since employment opportunities there will be much greater than where they are now. That will boomerang later on to a flourishing oasis in that desert. They can develop a sea shore resort (with gambling for those European and Saudi Magnates), with the sea shore (northern 15 miles) urbanized and the southern 25 miles agricultural, with ready markets in Europe for all "off season" agricultural goods.
Tell me why, with good will such a dream is "impossible". Why not a combination of Las Vegas and Singapore? The area proposed here 2000 Square miles (Egypt is about 400,000 square miles) is about ten times larger than Singapore.
Zeev |
