Snapshot Bio – Uri Ariel: Over the last few decades Uri Ariel has been at the forefront of the struggle to settle Yehuda, Aza, and the Shomron, and is considered the mover and shaker of the settler movement. He initiated and constructed dozens of settlements, and also served as the assistant for settlement issues to the Minister of Security.

Uri has served in a number of leadership positions within Yesha, most recently as the Chairman of the Yesha Council. Just until two weeks ago, he also served as the Director of the Municipal Council of Beit El, one of the largest settlements.

Following the assassination of Minister Ze’evi, Uri began to serve as a Member of Parliament representing the Nationalist Unity Party.

People who pride themselves on representing justice and logic, are actively working on transferring their fellow Jews. It’s simply one of the most terrible sins one could think up.

The army is doing outstanding work, and this is vital, for up until two months ago this wasn’t happening at all. Yet we still haven’t arrived at the real solution which is eliminating the P.A.

The children in Yesha haven’t even lost a day of school, and the real heroines of our generation are the mothers of Yesha, who stay to guard the land at any price.

It is surprising, and this results from the resignation of two Knesset members from the Nationalist Unity party, Benny Begin and Chanan Porat, and following the assassination of Rechavam Ze’evi. That’s how it became my turn to join the Knesset. After consulting with Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu and my family, I decided to join the Knesset. I will try to be of service in this role too.

There’s no comparison between knowing the Knesset from the outside and knowing it from the inside. Now I’m busy learning the ropes and I hope and pray that I can be of help to Ahm Yisroel and Eretz Yisroel.

Right now I feel like a student in a new place who has to learn everything. I feel more comfortable in the field than I do in the Knesset.

(smiling) In principle, yes. I love to transform the rocky hills into developed land. It’s what I’ve done for many years with my friends. But as I said, after consulting with rabbanim, family, and friends, I came to the conclusion that I can be of use in the Knesset too, and I will try to do so to the best of my abilities.

Right, those are the facts. On the other hand, I think every effort must be made so that there are many people in the Knesset who believe in our approach and will do good work. The job fell to me for tragic reasons, and I will try to do my best.

My first goal is obviously, settling Yesha, the Golan, and the entire country. I think settling the land must be strengthened. I also want to be involved in strengthening the area of absorption and immigration. There are people already involved in this, like Deputy Minister of Absorption, Yuli Edelstein, and the chairman of the committee for immigration and absorption, Tzvi Hendel, and I will try to help them.

Ze’evi always spoke about voluntary Transfer and his enemies besmirched him for this and said it was out of the question. Today, I don’t think there’s a Jew in the country who doesn’t support voluntary Transfer, except for some marginal groups. During the Six Day War we didn’t take advantage of the momentum when hundreds of thousands of Arabs left the country, and we didn’t encourage their leaving. The Lubavitcher Rebbe spoke a number of times about the Israeli government’s mistake in this. Furthermore, at a certain point, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan closed the gates and did not allow the Arabs to flee. If that wasn’t enough, he brought back some Arabs from Jordan, which was a terrible mistake because no one can promise us that we won’t have a similar situation in which the Arabs will want to leave voluntarily.

I think that Ze’evi’s platform is a platform that most Israelis agree with, and this was also checked out in the polls. Perhaps now it is not feasible to carry out, but in today’s situation in the Middle East, when things change every minute, nobody can promise us that the situation will not present itself in the future as realistic.

There can be nothing worse. People who pride themselves on representing justice and logic, are actively working on transferring their fellow Jews. It’s simply one of the most terrible sins one could think up. I am sure it won’t happen, but just talking about it is terrifying.

Israel must say one thing clearly, and unfortunately it doesn’t say it and might even say something else entirely: There is no reason for another country west of the Jordan! They cannot have authority over Eretz Yisroel, which belongs solely to the Jewish people. I am very upset by announcements by the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister on this topic, and for this reason, when I heard what Bush said, I am not at all surprised. First we have to clean up our own house.

Two weeks ago all the members of the Bloc sat down with the Prime Minister and he told us that a Palestinian state is not on the agenda. He said that if there was any change in the matter, it would be brought to open debate in the Knesset. But I can tell you that as soon as it even comes up we won’t be in this government, and we will do all we can to topple it.

I remember it well. He said it at a meeting of Likkud activists in Kiryat Mochkin. We protested and are pained over this. There’s no question this is extremely serious, but at the moment the government is not discussing it and so there’s still a difference.

I don’t feel it, but I’m afraid that something is going on as far as dealing with the Americans in connection with the Coalition against the Taliban. We told the Prime Minister that perhaps we understand what he is trying to accomplish by these tactics, but we also know what will result in the end. We remember good and well what happened with all Begin’s tactics at Camp David, and what happened with Rabin, Netanyahu, and Barak’s tactics. There cannot be any tactics in these matters, because in the end we pay for it. Somebody keeps track of what was said and in the end we pay the bill.

Let’s leave the fears for a moment. The first thing we need to know is where we are going and what we are doing to ourselves. I tell you straight that we will not even consider staying in a government that will approve this political agreement or another. This is not why we chose Sharon to lead the government. We won’t be part of such a government.

As far as your question as to whether this threatens or bothers him or not - Sharon said it bothers him, or at least that’s what he told us. It might happen that it will bother him and he’ll stop, or maybe not. In light of the political upheavals in recent years, it’s impossible to know anything except that in this country things change very quickly and you never know what tomorrow will bring.

Sharon is the Prime Minister, but Peres is very powerful and he uses this power to oppose the principles of the government and the wishes of the majority of the nation. I think that under the circumstances, Sharon has the added responsibility of preventing Peres from taking hasty and irreversible steps.

There is a change but it’s definitely not enough. Here are the facts: since his assassination three weeks ago, the army entered Area A in a number of places; it eliminated 46 wanted terrorists from the list of over a hundred. They also located other terrorists. This was definitely a course of action we haven’t had until now. But I say let’s not get too excited about it because it’s nowhere near enough.

The main question is whether to kill the flies that hover around the egg or whether to dry out the egg. We think the answer is obvious: you have to dry out the egg which is the P.A., and get Arafat out of here.

You can destroy a number of terrorists like these or others, but that won’t give us security. The army is doing outstanding work, and this is vital, for up until two months ago this wasn’t happening at all. Yet we still haven’t arrived at the real solution which is eliminating the P.A.

We hear about Peres and at the same time we hear that we can’t work with Arafat. Even within the Labor party there’s talk about how impossible he is.

Last week, a delegation of senior officials went to the U.S. to convey intelligence information. The U.S. is not ready to understand that even if their needs are being met by a Coalition to fight terror, we have to consider our own needs, just as America focuses solely on its own security. The time has come to learn from the Americans in this regard. Unfortunately in the meantime, we take their wishes too much into consideration.

We were very undecided. The reasons for remaining in the government despite the situation include two events: the first being the army’s entering Area A, and the second being Sharon’s declaration that he wouldn’t accept a Palestinian state. I know that people like to claim that our main concerns are out seats in the Knesset and our positions, yet I think my colleagues thought it through and decided based on the situation.

Because we have a Prime Minister who talks about a Palestinian state, and his Foreign Minister talks about it too. When you look around you see that not enough was done as far as security and settling the land. I wouldn’t say there’s a freeze in construction like there was under Rabin, but there is definitely not enough being done.

Despite the changes thus far, they are not enough, and so we are trying for greater changes. The big question is what will be with the Labor party. If it leaves the government, then the government is likely to be more on the Right. But things are murky now and you can’t know what will be.

We are checking out the possibilities of uniting with Mafdal. You have to remember that Tekuma and Moledet formed the Ichud HaLeumi, and with Minister Benny Alon’s initiative they joined forces with Yisroel Beiteinu. Now we hope to unite with Mafdal and we’re working on it.

My friends and I didn’t expect one demonstration to change everything, but I think that both the Right and Left saw that the Yesha council can bring a lot of people to Yerushalayim despite this period of turmoil when people are afraid to leave their homes.

Everybody understood, including the Prime Minister, that there’s a great force here that will not compromise. Sharon knows good and well that if he includes a Palestinian state in his plans or any other compromise, he will find a very large group who will do everything it can to block him.

First of all, all those living in Yesha deserve a huge medal. As far as how they manage, I don’t have explanations for everything, but the facts are that even mothers and children are standing strong. More families are joining them. It seems to depend on their way of life, for most of them believe that everything is from Heaven.

I was in Mevo Dosan yesterday because of the murder that took place there on Friday. There were people there from Chermesh who were definitely unhappy about the government’s not doing enough offensively, but they think about how to carry on despite it all. These are people with a goal in life, so it’s easier for them to endure this period, and this is what gives them strength.

I have to tell you that we too at the Yesha council were very doubtful, especially about the dangerous areas where there have been more terrorist attacks. But it didn’t happen. On the contrary, much to our surprise, most settlements have grown. I’d like to single out the Amana movement which settles the land, who do wonderful work.

With Hashem’s help, this is not happening. The army is fighting terrorism and Arafat has not succeeded in achieving his goals, and the settlers have stayed put. The children in Yesha haven’t even lost a day of school, and the real heroines of our generation are the mothers of Yesha, who stay to guard the land at any price.

Whoever breaks first will lose. The question is what is the goal and knowing what we are trying to attain.