Netanyahu Says South West Bank Settler Bloc 'Part of Jerusalem'

The Etzion settler bloc, which lies southwest of the Palestinian city of Bethlehem, is an "integral part" of Greater Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday.

"Efrat and Gush Etzion are an integral, basic and understood part of Greater Jerusalem," Netanyahu said while visiting Efrat settlement, in remarks relayed by his bureau.

"They are the southern gateway to Jerusalem and will always be part of the state of Israel."

Although Greater Jerusalem is not a legally-defined area, it is an informal concept which reveals Israeli territorial ambitions, Israeli and Palestinian experts on Jerusalem say.

Efrat lies immediately southwest of Bethlehem, while the Etzion bloc of 22 settlements, comprising some 70,000 residents, lies still further out, some 10 kilometers southwest of the current boundaries of the Holy City.

According to Danny Seidemann, a legal expert in Jerusalem affairs, Netanyahu had during his first term as prime minister (1996-1999), tried to formalize the concept of Greater Jerusalem which would have dramatically expanded the city's current boundaries.

Netanyahu "brought a resolution to cabinet establishing a Greater Jerusalem umbrella municipality," he told Agence France Presse, saying the resolution was approved, but never implemented.

Opponents say such a move would be nothing less than a de facto annexation of the West Bank.

The status of Jerusalem, the eastern sector of which was occupied and annexed by Israel after the 1967 Six-Day War, is one of the most thorny issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Khalil Tafakji, a Palestinian cartographer and expert on Jerusalem, said that if the concept of Greater Jerusalem were formalized, it would comprise 10 percent of the West Bank, compared with the 1.2 percent currently included in the city boundaries.

"Greater Jerusalem would be a metropolitan area consisting of 10 percent of the West Bank, which would include this Jerusalem, which is only 1.2 percent of the West Bank."