Rejecting a government proposal to peacefully move to an adjacent plot, the settlers of Amona, who stole privately-owned Palestinian land to establish an illegal outpost, are vowing to fight. Amona’s forty families – reinforced by thousands of zealous settlers – are hunkering down for a confrontation with law enforcement officials, which could take place as early as tomorrow night.

The settlers are being removed from Amona after Peace Now, together with the Palestinian land-owners, won a petition to Israel's High Court. The settlers promised that they will "only" passively resist the eviction, but past experience shows that their passive resistance quickly and easily turns into violence. Graffiti sprayed in Amona promising "Death to the Policemen” serves as an indication of the settlers' intentions. It's going to be ugly. It's going to be violent. It's going to be bloody. Not because Israel's police and the IDF want that, but because that's the way the settlers want it to be.

The settlers' objective is clear, and they have openly and publicly stated it in the past. They seek deterrence. They want to show the Israeli government and the Israeli public that removing any settlement, any outpost, any settler home, comes with such a high price tag that no one would even entertain the idea of a wholesale removal of settlements in the context of an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement. That is precisely why "Price Tag" is what they named their campaign to terrorize Palestinians and wreak havoc in the West Bank.

We at Americans for Peace Now and our friends at Israel’s Shalom Achshav movement refuse to be deterred. We will not be terrorized: Not by the settlers and not by American bullies, like David Friedman, Donald Trump's choice for ambassador to Israel, who calls supporters of the two-state solution "kapos." Friedman is already preparing to move America’s Israel embassy to Jerusalem, an incendiary, provocative act that no American president – Republican or Democrat - has ever made. We refuse to acquiesce as Trump hands the fire brigade to a pyromaniac. Peace Now will not stand by as settlers grab more and more Palestinian land to trump the two-state solution.

We will continue to advocate for what is right for Israel and the US, and our friends in Israel will continue to challenge the Israeli government's settlement policies in the courts, in the Knesset, in the media and on the streets.

Your support is what allows us and Shalom Achshav to stand up to the settlers and the bullies and to continue to fight the enemies of peace. Please make a generous, tax deductible donation to APN before 2016 is out.

Donate now and the impact of your support will be doubled. I will match your donation up to $18,000.

Wishing you a happy holiday season,
Jim Klutznick

Americans for Peace Now