“Zero” tolerance

The West Bank settlement money-go-round

If you were tempted to move house at all, and wanted something that bit more upmarket from what the average Gaza Strip Palestinian is able to aspire to in terms of a des res these days, then your attention may perchance wander across to the other bit of Palestine, which ought not truly to be up for grabs according to international law, British law or, nota bene, American law, given how the erection of residential settlements in the West Bank area has been described (by Antony Blinken, the American foreign secretary, no less, in a statement made in Argentina in February 2024) as a serious stumbling block to peace in Israel. He should know, being a senior member of the US’s government. I wonder how much he knows about its tax system?

Image: The walled completed part of the road in Biyar Al Mahawer, from http://poica.org/2004/09/israeli-prayers-road-built-on-ruins-of-ancient-palestinian-houses-in-the-old-city-of-hebron/.

America is taking strident measures against people who stand athwart of Mr Blinken’s ambitions for Middle Eastern peace—such as they may or may not be—by levying sanctions on people who engage in violence against Palestinians in the West Bank or who occupy the West Bank illegally. Except in one case, that is: the sanctions don’t apply if you’re a dual passport holder of Israel and the United States of America. In that case, the sanctions are not applicable.

You may question how many Americans could even potentially—barring the exemption—be affected by US sanctions against illegal West Bank settlers, and I can’t tell you exactly. In 2015, Oxford University said it was around about 60,000, when the total number of settlers stood at around 400,000; now the latter total is up at 700,000, so the chance of the number of Americans exceeding 60,000 is now all the greater.

For many such Americans, the land that they occupy is not donated, not by the State of Israel, and it certainly is not donated by the Palestinian farmers and families who previously used to occupy it, in some cases for many hundreds of years. When settlers are asked where the land came from that they occupy, they often reply that it came from the State and was never occupied before. The truth is, however, that it’s not actually there for the taking, unlike Oklahoma was back in the day: it needs to be paid for. But, that notwithstanding, the common response is that the land has been donated by God in Heaven above (although His signature is strangely not to be seen in the chain of title). With a vendor price for prime real estate in the West Bank running at around about 250,000 shekels for a middle-class suburban family home (the equivalent of around 67,500 US dollars, not a bad price in anyone’s language, certainly in Hebrew), of all the possible benevolent sources for the land that might be located in the West Bank—Palestinians, Israel, and, don’t forget, God Almighty—the principal benefactors aren’t even to be found in that place. They’re all the way back in America.

“Where, exactly, in America, is the body that proffers all this subsidised bounty?” I hear you ask. Well, I cannot tell you exactly where they are, because they are to be found wherever there is an American who pays income tax. For, one of the great benefactors funding the illegal settlement of the West Bank is the American taxpayer. Purchases of illegal settlement land in the West Jordan Bank of Palestine are financially facilitated by a registered US charity called One Israel Fund. And donations to One Israel Fund therefore qualify for a tax break under section 501 of the US Tax Code. In short, a qualifying donation to One Israel Fund is a donation by the entire American tax-paying public.

That means that—in theory—you can donate to One Israel Fund and claim a tax break on your other income, and then you can up sticks and move to Israel (if you’re Jewish or of Jewish heritage, that is) and apply to purchase property in the West Bank for the equivalent of a sum on which you’ll have been given a tax break in the US, for which One Israel Fund will facilitate you the purchase price, and then you can move in, having had the whole transaction facilitated by the US registered charity (except your moving costs—but, if I were you, I’d ask One Israel Fund nicely about them).

Of course, this may ruffle the feathers of local Palestinians whose land you have moved onto, but nothing that a Glock cannot handle and, if things get hairy in the security field, One Israel Fund will throw in a surveillance drone so you can keep an eye on scouting parties looking to reclaim the land that, by this stage, why not?, one can truthfully say has been God-given especially since those who have funded it in God do trust.

One man interviewed by Al Jazeera in Al-Mahawer near Hebron, who is originally from the US, declares that people should be allowed to live anywhere, especially on land that was granted by God in perpetuity to Abraham (who wasn’t from Israel but from Ur, in Iraq, actually—I only have ‘O’-level Scripture, but I got an A, so even I know that). There is therefore a long tradition in Israel of land being appropriated by people to whom it doesn’t belong, to be given to other people, to whom it also doesn’t belong. When asked whether the settler would find it okay to have a Palestinian live next to him, it appeared that the people who should be allowed to live anywhere do not include Palestinians, not in Al-Mahawer, which is a small community replete with religious Jews. So, the answer was … Ur … “Yes, but not here.”

It’s arrant nonsense. Jews, just like any other religious grouping, are perfectly capable of living in utter harmony with people of another confessional faith. They do everywhere else on the globe (do they not?), but, then again, anyone who identifies with any sort of grouping, however it might be specified, and then occupies land illegally is likely not to be so very welcome. That has nothing to do with being a Jew; it has to do with being a thief. Until such point as Israel is able to produce God’s notarial deed of conveyance to Abraham, it does.

Even then, deeming the State of Israel to be the natural successor to the land grant effected by God in favour of Abraham is a little redolent of the Russian Federation deeming itself to be the natural successor to anything that was previously administered by the almighty Soviet Union (along the lines of because we say so). The usual period for positive prescription to take effect is 30 years, so Ukraine’s kinda on the cusp of that (just over, in fact); but the 3,200 years that have elapsed since Rameses II was pharaoh of Egypt is stretching things a little. As is killing up to 40,000 people in the name of God in a bid to reclaim title under that way-prescribed land transfer. Maybe it’s God who killed them, like He sent the plague of gnats.

If you’re an American with designs on a suburban plot in Hebron and decide to go and lay ancient claim to it, however, that plot will have cost Israel the military outlays of conquering the West Bank, which you obviously won’t have to foot; and there will be the human cost to Palestine of the original occupants being evicted (assuming original means pre-1967), which, again, will not be your worry; but, in purely financial terms, there will be a very tolerable zero cost to Israel (since the land you occupy isn’t its), a tolerable zero cost to One Israel Fund (since the money it gives you has been received from you in the first place), and a tolerably zero cost to you (since the money you donated to One Israel Fund entitled you to a tax break back in the US). Now, isn’t that all nice and tolerably neat and tidy? You could go one step further and aver that the whole cost of the enterprise is assumed by the US government, rather than just its taxpayers, but that might be an averment intolerably too far, given Mr Blinken’s explicit policy statement regarding settlements in the West Bank, made in Argentina in February. Don’t you think? Surely he wouldn’t contemplate a policy that directly opposed his, oh, so cherished peace initiatives in the Middle East, now, would he?

Back in Hebron, the drone and the Glock can be used freely, with tolerably zero recriminations, since the Israeli State is unlikely to sanction you for their use (often, IDF troops simply look on or even assist in settler violence). And, what’s more, as long as you hang onto the cherished US passport, the US can level as many sanctions as it pleases, they will never, ever apply to you. A very tolerable zero sanction. Besides which, and into the bargain (and a bargain is, indeed, what it is), using your Glock to help reduce the remaining Palestinian occupants of the West Bank to a zero level (a matter nevertheless of questionable overall tolerability) could end up being the best way to thank Israel for this wonderful new life in a terra nullius plot of prime real estate that, according to the chap Gideon in Al-Mahawer, never belonged to anyone, not to zero anyone (aside from old Abe, of course).

Now, this could be a situation of which the US government and/or the Israeli government is/are blissfully and innocently unaware. It could just be an unfortunate loophole in a complex tax system, but one cannot but help arrive at one last fortuitous conclusion, to which there seems not to be any particular resolution at this time, especially when conjuring what measures the US might want to take to close these glaring loops of holes. And that is that Aliyah-makers moving to Israel from America with two passports in their pocket are far from having flit the nest away into the broad, wide world, as far as America’s concerned. Oh, no, far from it, because, with two passports, they now also vote for two countries’ leaders.