thumb|upright=1.3|Gush Etzion in the 2018 OCHA OpT map, showing both the modern definition and the area of the original 1943-48 settlements

thumb|250px|[[Beitar Illit, the largest city in Gush Etzion, was founded in 1985]]

Gush Etzion (, ' Etzion Bloc) is a cluster of Israeli settlements located in the Judaean Mountains, directly south of Jerusalem and Bethlehem in the West Bank. The core group includes four Jewish agricultural villages that were founded in 1943–1947, and destroyed by the Arab Legion on May 13, 1948 in the 1948 Palestine war, in the Kfar Etzion massacre. The area was left outside of Israel with the 1949 armistice lines. These settlements were rebuilt after the 1967 Six-Day War, along with new communities that have expanded the area of the Etzion Bloc.

The international community considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal under international law, but Israel disagrees.

History

thumb|The four kibbutzes of the Gush Etzion at the time of the 1948 war ([[Kfar Etzion, Ein Zurim, Massuot Yitzhak, Revadim) overlaid on a 1943 Survey of Palestine map. The land area is shown as being within the village boundaries of Khirbet Beit Zakariyyah.]]

thumb|1943 [[Survey of Palestine map, shortly prior to the founding of Jewish settlements in the area. “Kefar Etsyon” is shown as abandoned (top left), referring to the 1935-37 failed settlement. No other Jewish settlements are shown in the area.]]

The four core original settlements of Gush Etzion were Kfar Etzion (founded in 1943), Massu'ot Yitzhak (1945), Ein Tzurim (1946) and Revadim (1947); the land area of all four were located within the village boundaries of Khirbet Beit Zakariyyah. The other villages surrendered the next day. The inhabitants were taken prisoner and the homes were plundered and burned.

The establishment, defense and fall of Gush Etzion have been described as "one of the major episodes of the State of Israel-in-the-making", playing a significant role in Israeli collective memory. The motivation for resettling the region is not so much ideological, political or security-related as symbolic, linked in the Israeli psyche to the massive loss of life (1% of its total population) in the 1947–1949 Palestine war.

Settlements in Mandatory Palestine

thumb|[[Revadim, December 1947]]

thumb|right|250px|Kibbutz [[Masu'ot Yitzhak, May 1947]]

thumb|250px|[[Kfar Etzion, 1947]]

In 1927, a group of religious Yemenite Jews founded an agricultural village they named Migdal Eder (), based on a biblical quotation ().

In 1932, a Jewish businessman of German extraction, Shmuel Zvi Holtzmann, provided financial backing for another attempt at resettling the area, through a company named El HaHar ("To the Mountain").

Interim period (1949–1967)

thumb|right|"The lone oak", one of Gush Etzion's symbols

In May 1948, the women and children evacuated from the bloc before the battle were taken to the Ratisbonne Monastery in Jerusalem. In June 1948, when the road to Jerusalem was opened, they were moved to Petah Tikva for two months. The refugees lived at the Netzah Yisrael school until the school year began, later resettling in Giv'at Aliyah, a neighborhood in Jaffa organized like a kibbutz.

Four years later, the returning prisoners of war of the bloc founded Nir Etzion in the Mount Carmel area near Haifa. Nir Etzion sought to accept the majority of the bloc's children into it, but despite wishing to unite in a new place of residence, the issue of joining Nir Etzion was a matter of debate among the children, many of whom joined the Nahal military unit. The survivors of Masu'ot Yitzhak, Ein Tzurim, and Revadim founded their communities anew in Israel proper. According to Ra'anan Weitz's plan, Kfar Etzion was meant to be one of three settlements in the new bloc, which also included Aviezer. A new middle village would be established on Jewish National Fund land purchased in the 1940s.

Today

Here is a list of communities in modern Gush Etzion.

{| class="wikitable sortable"

|-

!Name!!Founded!!Population <br />(EOY 2008) an automotive repair shop, a Rami Levy discount supermarket, an electronics store, the Gush Etzion Winery (one minute towards Alon Shvut on the north side of the road), a bakery, natural foods store, eyeglass shop, clothing store and pizza / felafel / shawarma stands. Across the street are a nursery and car dealership. The junction is a popular hitchhiking post, both south to Hebron / Be'er Sheva and north to Jerusalem, as well as west towards Bet Shemesh and the coast) which has frequently been the site of attacks by Palestinians against Israeli citizens.

2014 "State land" classifications

thumb|left|2014 Declarations of "State Land" in Gush Etzion settlement bloc

On 6 April and 25 August 2014, the Israeli Civil Administration declared 1,000 and 3,799 dunums of land respectively in the Bethlehem Governorate within the boundaries of Surif, Nahalin, Husan, Jab'a and Wadi Fukin villages as "state land".

The United States responded to the announcement by rebuking Israel for taking measures that were 'counter-productive' to the two-state solution in peace talks. The expropriation was also condemned by the United Nations, the United Kingdom, Egypt, France, Spain, Russia, the European Union, Turkey, Norway, Japan and Amnesty International.

As of September 2014, eight years after approving the 45&nbsp;km stretch of barrier enclosing Gush Etzion, no progress had been made on it. The reclassified land would be on the Palestinian side of the barrier. On 21 September 2014, the government voted to not reauthorize the barrier in the Gush Etzion area.

See also

  • Convoy of 35
  • Gush Etzion Convoy

References

Bibliography

  • Gush Etzion home page.