Israel Matzav

Which Prime Minister built the most homes in Judea and Samaria and when?

Which Israeli Prime Minister built the most housing units in Judea and Samaria? It wasn't Binyamin Netanyahu. Not in the first term and not in the second term. My own guess was Shimon Peres in the 1980's, which is probably correct, but the survey was only since 1991. Yitzchak Rabin? No. Would you believe Ehud Barak? That's what Channel 10 reported this week.

In fact, Bibi in his current term built less than any other Prime Minister in the survey - a bit more than a quarter of what Barak built and about two thirds of what Olmert built. Here are the results (they're in Hebrew, but you can figure them out).


The numbers are based on the actual housing construction that began inside the Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria during each Prime Minister's term.

By the way, I would argue that Peres should still be the champion by that measure. He was Prime Minister for only six and a half months in 1995-96 (he took over when Rabin was assassinated in November 1995, there was an election at the end of May 1996, and by June 1996 Netanyahu had taken office for his first term).

The numbers don't include infrastructure (roads, pipes, etc.) and they don't net out the number of homes destroyed by Sharon and Netanyahu.

Now here's a chart that shows the number of construction tenders during each year since 2002.

Note the two goose eggs for Netanyahu in 2009 and 2010, and that the two highest numbers both belong to Sharon in 2003 and 2005.

It should be clear from these charts that until the 'Palestinians' violated the status quo by going to the UN, Netanyahu was no 'worse' than his predecessors when it came to constructing new housing in Judea and Samaria. Maybe now that he realizes that there isn't going to be peace anytime soon, he'll change his tune. 

More here.

Labels: Ariel Sharon, Binyamin Netanyahu, Ehud Barak, Ehud K. Olmert, Judea and Samaria construction, Shimon Peres, Yitzchak Rabin

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:33 PM