What Dani Dayan Says and Why It is Interesting by Richard Falk

What Dani Dayan Says and Why It Is Interesting by Richard Falk

            Dani Dayan

’s article, “Israel’s Settlers Are Here to Stay,” was published by the NY Times on July 26, 2012. Dayan is the chairman of the Yesha Council of Jewish Communities, and has been long known as a leading spokesperson of the settler movement. An obvious response to such a settler screed might be to dismiss it out of hand as an extremist expression of Israeli views, which it certainly is, but it would seem a mistake to do this before taking some account of its content and timing. The moral and legal premises that underlie Dayan’s insistence that the settlers will never leave the West Bank are without substance, but the political arguments he puts forward are so strong as to be virtually irrefutable. It may also be helpful to speculate that Dayan might have been encouraged from the Netanyahu side, known for being as friendly to settler dreams as any Israeli leadership ever, to drop this bombshell into the midst of the American electoral maelstrom as kind of trial baloon.