Subduing the settlement enterprise

[bemildred]

In the wake of a petition filed by the Israeli Arab legal center Adalah about a year ago, the High Court of Justice ruled that the government must abolish the "national preference" regions in education. The Education Ministry's chief scientist, Prof. Sidney Strauss, is currently formulating a new budgeting index for educational institutions. The primary - and apparently only - institutions that will be negatively affected by this will be the educational institutions in the settlements.

Governments that are interested in encouraging the population of certain areas declare them to be areas of national preference and give the residents direct benefits such as grants and indirect benefits in education, mortgages or other areas, as well as tax breaks. To prevent residents from abandoning the North, for instance, many communities in the Galilee receive major tax and education benefits. The same holds for the Negev. In addition, kibbutzim with few students also receive funds from the "settlement education" budget.

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Indeed, the suburban communities in Judea and Samaria do not have to be included under a national preference plan in any sphere. By contrast, the mountain ridge communities, whose residents risk their lives daily, do need to be included - and not just in education. In these communities, traveling to regional schools is dangerous, which is why they have classrooms with fewer students than the norm. The sweeping, discriminatory decision to abolish the national preference regions, apparently also in relation to these communities, will only intensify the bitterness that this sector feels toward the government, and in extreme cases, it will intensify the bitterness that members of this sector feel toward the state in general.

Abolishing the educational benefits for settlers comes after the traumatic events of the uprooting of 25 communities in Gush Katif and the failure, to this day, to adequately cope with those who were uprooted. It comes after the construction of residential units was banned in the settlements, and not just in the outposts - an illegal and non-humanitarian order. It comes after the High Court ordered the destruction of houses in Amona in the wake of a Peace Now petition - a command that led to the serious police violence against youths who holed up there and generated anger against police, the army and the judiciary. And it comes as 42 families are meant to be evacuated from Migron, once more following a Peace Now petition to the High Court.

Haaretz