Richard Melson

September 2004

Yesha is a Hebrew acronym for Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

The Yesha Council represents the settler movement which Sharon spurred to block the possible formation of a Palestinian state and to advance creeping annexation.

See below:

What is the Yesha Council? The Yesha Council

History
The Yesha Council was founded in the late 70''s as the successor to Gush Emunim, the organization which spearheaded the return of Jews to their historical homeland in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza district. In the near twenty five years since the establishment of the Yesha Council, the population of Yesha has grown from less than 3,000 to nearly 225,000 and the number continues to grow annually.

Framework
The Council represents all of the cities, towns and villages in Yesha. Its plenum is comprised of twenty five democratically elected mayors and ten other community leaders. The present Board of Directors, elected by the members of the plenum, is composed of:

Mr. Bentzi Lieberman (Mayor of Samaria) – Chairman of the Board
Mr. Hisdai Eliezer (Mayor of Alfei Menashe) - Vice Chairman
Mr. Shaul Goldstein (Mayor of Gush Etzion) - Deputy Chairman
Mr. Pinchas Wallerstein (Mayor of Binyamin)
Mr. Zvi Bar-Chai (Mayor of Hebron Hills)
Mr. Zeev Chever (CEO of Amana)
Mr. Adi Mintz – CEO, Yesha Council

Responsibilities

The Yesha Council is charged with three critical tasks:

Security
The security of the men, women and children of Yesha, their roads and communities is of paramount importance to its leadership, whose contact with leading defense ministry and army officials is in "real time". Recent fruit of this developing and growing relationship includes acquisition of bulletproof buses, vans and ambulances, additional security forces in Yesha communities and the development and implementation of a new defense strategy. The Council ensures that allocations are distributed to all Yesha communities, large and small, on a "real need" basis.


Humanitarian and Municipal Needs
The Council is always at the forefront of the battles for improved living conditions for the Jews of Yesha. Funding for educational facilities and programs and for increased psychological and welfare assistance for children and adults are just two examples of recent. Quality roads, upgraded infrastructure (electricity, water, sewage and communications), finances, and long term planning are discussed on an ongoing basis with relevant governmental ministries.


Political Action and Public Advocacy
The war against the State of Israel and the battle over the integrity of our national homeland will only be successfully achieved by a multi-pronged, concerted and coordinated effort in the battlefields, in the media, in leading political power centers and most importantly, in the hearts and minds of the Jewish people. A fundamental shift in the minds of the Jewish people which includes a belief in the historic, strategic and religious elements of our right to Eretz Yisrael is a prerequisite for effecting a change in the world's media and political leaders.
The Yesha Council is committed to employing its full resources to implementing the above shift, by meeting with Israeli and world leaders, continuous interfacing with the media and when deemed necessary, by marshalling our forces to bring hundreds of thousands of people to the streets for peaceful and democratic public demonstrations
Strengthening and increasing the Jewish presence of our historic homeland is the primary challenge of the council. Towards this end, the council serves as a political action committee which protects the Jewish nature and future of the State of Israel while protecting the sovereignty of Eretz Yisrael from those who would casually relinquish it to enemies of the Jewish people.


*Yesha is a Hebrew acronym for Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

About Bentzi Lieberman - Yesha Board Chairman Bentzi Lieberman – Chairman of the Board, Yesha Council

Profile

• Born in 1959, Hadera.
• Married to Tami, a midwife.
• Father of six children
• His father was the Deputy-Mayor of Hadera
• His brother is the mayor of Karnei Shomron


• Graduate of Midrashiyat Noam High School
• Served in army during the Lebanon War as a Hesder student in Yeshivat Har Etzion
• Graduate of Bar Ilan law school

• In 1984 he was one of the founders of the community "Peduel" in the Shomron. Served as chairman of community board.
• One of the founders of "B'Tzedek" - a right wing civil rights organization
• Presently serving his second term as the mayor of the Shomron Regional Council

From Oslo to the Present:


Settlement in Yesha triumphs!

The nineties arrived, ushering in the Madrid Conference and the Oslo Accords. The Shamir government was defeated in the elections and the incoming leftist government declared a freeze on all building, even on buildings that had already been started. Despite these decrees, ways were found to continue building, to absorb new residents and to increase the Yesha population. Somehow the outpost of Rechelim, near Shilo, was allowed to continue and other small outposts in Judea and Benjamin were established. The government built many bypass roads in order to prevent contact and minimize friction between the Jewish residents and the new Palestinian Authority. These new roads dramatically changed the transport situation in the area, usually for the better. When Benjamin Netanyahu rose to power, the laws freezing building and cutting off funds were repealed and the efforts at increasing the population were renewed.

From the very beginning of the settlement enterprise, Jews had to cope with hostile acts on the part of their Arab neighbours. In the early years, settlers hiked and wandered throughout Arab populated areas freely, occasionally opening accounts in banks in Ramallah and in Shechem, or shopping and taking driving lessons there. However, as time went on, these activities became rarer and rarer. In the late seventies, attacks were carried out against Jewish traffic, mainly in the form of stone throwing. In the early eighties, this escalated to the use of firearms. Yehoshua Saloma, a yeshiva student was the first victim, shot to death in the market in Hevron in early 1980. A few months later, six Jews were murdered outside Beit Hadassah in Hevron. In the summer of 1982, a resident of Tekoa was murdered at Herodion. In reaction, the settlement of Nokdim was immediately created at the spot of the murder.

Regretfully, most of the governments reacted hesitantly and slowly to anti-Jewish terror attacks which caused the Arabs to escalate their attacks. These reached their climax in 1987 when the intifada started. Many Jewish residents were wounded in these attacks, some of whom were maimed for the rest of their lives. In Samaria and in Benjamin, a number of Jews were killed in shooting attacks. The number of casualties rose from year to year. This situation had an adverse effect on the efforts to increase the population of the area and visits to the area by people from the rest of the country decreased. Even so, at the end of each year, a steady rise in the number of residents was noted. Despite the fact that all recent governments decided not to establish new settlements but rather to upgrade and increase existing ones, new settlements are not a rare sight. Quite often, one meets second and even third generation pioneers of Kiryat Arba and Sebastia there.