The Settlements is a difficult optic to frame, and its incredibly easy to frame it in a way that makes Israel look bad.

Does 20-25% of the religious population of Israel have illusions of a Greater Israel? Yep. The West Bank was the heart of ancient biblical Israel and contains Hebron, Bethlehem and the Tomb of the Patriarchs. But just like there's 20% of the people in any country that believe stupid shit like Gay Conversion Therapy- it happens, every country has their loons.

The problem is Israel is a parliamentary democracy. So that 20% can ally with an opportunistic center-right party like Likud and form an unbeatable coalition. Kind of like how Corporatist republicans allied with the Religious Right during the Bush years worked together to control goverment for a better part of a decade.

And while the other 75% of Israelis understand that those deep Settlements will need to be removed in a peace deal, the majority also do not think peace is anywhere close from happening given Palestinian behaviour and statements in Arabic by their leaders. So giving into Palestinian demands to stop building there and to stop "Occupying" is pretty much conceding the land to them before any negotiations have happened.

Theres also the other issue: the far majority of the Settlements are around Jerusalem, near the Green Line. Israel plans on negotiating land swaps for equal or better land in a future deal. So, these settlements aren't as troublesome.

The reality here is simple: Arabs invaded Israel instead of accepting a UN resolution. Israel won, various times. Israel wants peace, and Palestinians want a state. If Israel leaves and does not touch the land, does not police it, it has defacto conceded the only leverage it has to gain peace. This will simply lead to another Gaza.

I've always thought the only solution to this conflict is for Europe and the US to stop giving Palestinians money, and to be fair, for the US to stop giving Israel military aid. Why? Palestinians have formed an economy out of violence. The people in the PLO and Hamas are all millionaires off of aid and these organizations keep thousands of people employed in their service and military wings- all with foreign donations. What incentive do they have to negotiate when they have the West subsidizing their way of life? They're sitting pretty exactly where they are. They can sit in their offices and coordinate UNESCO smears, post a couple of pictures of babies maimed in Syria and claim the Israelis did that to get people in Europe pissed, and just wait and hope for a boycott similar to South Africa.