Sharon Rejects Settlement Curbs

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Tuesday categorically rejected U.S. and international calls to halt the expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and instead vowed to continue building new homes on occupied land.

Casting the 7-month-old Palestinian uprising as a historic struggle between Zionism and Arab intransigence, Sharon said he was determined to prevail. He accused the Palestinian Authority of stockpiling long-range weapons and blamed its president, Yasser Arafat, for escalating skirmishes in which Israeli forces this week killed a 4-month-old Palestinian girl, the youngest victim thus far of the violence.

In a news conference with foreign reporters, Sharon laid down a series of hard-and-fast positions that, while not new, further illustrated his uncompromising approach toward the Palestinians--and the radical contrast between the philosophy of this right-wing prime minister and those of some predecessors.

Most of the questions fielded by the 73-year-old retired general and veteran of all of Israel’s wars focused on Jewish settlements, considered illegal under international law and an infuriating provocation to Palestinians who claim the land for an eventual sovereign state.

An international panel led by former Sen. George J. Mitchell (D-Maine), which conducted the only independent investigation into the conflict, is urging the Israeli government to impose an immediate freeze on all settlement construction.

But Sharon, who in previous governments led the campaign to spread Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank and Gaza, said Tuesday that he couldn’t see “any reason” for such a demand. In fact, Israeli newspaper reports this week said Sharon plans to spend as much as $200 million more on settlements, including security.

Asked if he would consider halting settlement expansion in exchange for an end to the violence, which has taken more than 500 lives, most of them Palestinian, Sharon said: “We don’t have to pay in order not to be killed. We will not pay protection money.”

While he said his government will not build new settlements, existing ones will have to expand to accommodate population growth.

“A Jewish family is going to have a baby,” he said. “What should they do? Abortion? . . . Should they live three generations in two small rooms? . . . What would you say? They have to leave the place?”

Reports that Israel plans to allocate more money to support settlements drew fire from the Bush administration. The funding “risks further inflaming the already volatile situation in the region and is provocative,” said State Department spokesman Philip T. Reeker.

About 200,000 Jews live in more than 140 settlements scattered all across the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and these communities chop up the valleys and hills that would form the Palestinian state. Palestinians, who number about 3 million in the same area, say ridding the land of the settlements is one of the principal goals of their revolt.

Early today, the bodies of two 14-year-old boys from a settlement near the West Bank city of Bethlehem were discovered in a cave. Missing since Tuesday, the boys apparently had been beaten and stabbed to death, probably by Palestinian militants in the area, Israeli police said.

Israeli opposition leaders say the argument that settlements must expand to accommodate growth is bogus because many of the homes in those areas are vacant.

Sharon has long argued that the settlements serve strategic purposes far beyond housing. They were placed to stake Israel’s claim to the land, give the Jewish state military advantage by taking hilltops and weaken the Palestinian grasp on the land.

In Tuesday’s news conference at Jerusalem’s King David Hotel, Sharon rejected the long-standing international definition of the West Bank and Gaza Strip as “occupied” territories, status they’ve held since Israel captured the areas during the 1967 Middle East War. “It is not occupied territory but disputed territory,” he said.

Sprinkling his comments with folksy recollections of growing up on a hardscrabble farm, Sharon seemed to be conjuring a bygone Israel. He appeared dismissive of Palestinian nationalism, referring to Palestinian-ruled territory as land that “various governments had granted” to the Palestinians. He chafed slightly at the use of the term “Palestinians,” saying it had only become popular in the 1930s; they had always been “Arabs” until then, he said.

For Sharon, Israel’s existence and challenge today is part of a century-long continuum cast always as a Zionist struggle against the Arabs. Looking back at 100 years of accomplishment in what he called the “Zionist revolution” allowed him to be optimistic about the future of the Jewish state, he said.

Sharon reiterated his absolute refusal to negotiate with Arafat while shooting continues. “If you ask can this be solved by military steps, no, I never thought that,” he said. “But there has to be quiet before there can be a political solution.”

As Sharon was speaking, thousands of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip crowded the funeral of 4-month-old Iman Hijjo, who was killed Monday when Israeli forces unleashed a barrage of tank fire on a Gazan refugee camp. The Israelis said they were responding to mortar fire from the area.

Sharon said he has no desire to reoccupy land under Palestinian rule but defended the right of his army to stage incursions into such areas when necessary to go after gunmen.

Referring to a boatload of weapons intercepted over the weekend by the Israeli navy, Sharon accused the Palestinians of planning a “very dangerous” escalation. He said two or three earlier boatloads may have reached their destination. The seized weapons included antiaircraft missiles, Katyusha rockets and mines, all of which are considerably more potent that anything the Palestinians are known to have.

Sharon was asked whether Arafat would be targeted by the Israelis. Some Palestinian security officials and militants accused of taking part in the violence have met a sudden demise.

“We are not taking any steps against political leaders,” he said. “So if you ask, ‘Is he safe from our side?’ yes, he is safe from our side. But I don’t know if we are the only danger that exists.”

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Times staff writer Robin Wright in Washington contributed to this report.