From: shaig@Think.COM (Shai Guday)
Subject: Re: Investment in Yehuda and Shomron
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA
Lines: 30
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: composer.think.com

In article <horenC5LDuz.5sE@netcom.com>, horen@netcom.com (Jonathan B. Horen) writes:
|> 
|> While I applaud investing of money in Yehuda, Shomron, v'Chevel-Azza,
|> in order to create jobs for their residents, I find it deplorable that
|> this has never been an active policy of any Israeli administration
|> since 1967, *with regard to their Jewish residents*. Past governments
|> found funds to subsidize cheap (read: affordable) housing and the
|> requisite infrastructure, but where was the investment for creating
|> industry (which would have generated income *and* jobs)? 

The investment was there in the form of huge tax breaks, and employer
benfits.  You are overlooking the difference that these could have
made to any company.  Part of the problem was that few industries
were interested in political settling, as much as profit.

|> After 26 years, Yehuda and Shomron remain barren, bereft of even 
|> middle-sized industries, and the Jewish settlements are sterile
|> "bedroom communities", havens for (in the main) Israelis (both
|> secular *and* religious) who work in Tel-Aviv or Jerusalem but
|> cannot afford to live in either city or their surrounding suburbs.

True, which leads to the obvious question, should any investment have
been made there at the taxpayer's expense.  Obviously, the answer was
and still is a resounding no.

-- 
Shai Guday              | Stealth bombers,
OS Software Engineer    |
Thinking Machines Corp. |	the winged ninjas of the skies.
Cambridge, MA           |
