In reporting Israel’s decision to declare nearly 1,000 acres of the West Bank as state lands, our media were quick to round up the usual Palestinian suspects for denunciation of Israel’s move as a land grab to expand Jewish settlements so as to doom a two-state solution. Washington Post correspondents William Booth and Ruth Eglash obliged with a major article in the Sept. 1 edition that takes up half of page A10  (“Israel proposes taking more West Bank land for settlers”) The second paragraph of the Booth-Eglash article cites Peace Now as calling it “the largest land appropriation in 30 years.” Then there is the always dependable Hanan Ashrawi who calls the move part of Israel’s intent “to wipe out any Palestinian presence on the land and to willfully impose a de facto one-state solution.” And piling it on even more, Booth and Eglash quote Hagit Ofran, director of Peace Now’s Settlement Watch, as calling...(Read Full Post)