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Jul 3, 2012

Initial Plans For RBS D Approved

The financial newspaper Calcalist is reporting that the first detailed plans for the next neighborhoods of RBS to enter the stages of construction have been approved. The planning committee put aside plans for the construction of 1440 homes in the southern hills of Bet Shemesh spanning 780 dunams of land.

This is one of 6 sets of plans for what will be RBS D, and the planning takes into account the archaeological site of Tel Yarmout.

This is part of a larger plan in which the specific area will include 5300 apartments.

Mention is made that the activists trying to persuade leaders of the Likud (specifically the Prime Minister) to split Bet Shemesh still have not been able to make convincing arguments. In the meantime, mention is also made, haredi entrepreneurs and purchase groups are looking to buy up large tracts of the area to sell to their groups of followers.

The juxtaposition of the two is telling, and it seems this is what has happened all along. Opponents fight the plans, while the haredim make plans to buy the area out as much as possible. What ends up happening, so far at least, is that the oppositions have been rejected (while requiring slight alterations of plans) while the haredim ended up buying significant portions. There was a late notice in the haredi paper Chadash last week that the latest appeals regarding Gimmel 2 have now been rejected. The oppositions have been going nowhere.

Those who oppose the neighborhoods due to the largely haredi population expected to move in might do better work if they tried to buy sections of the neighborhoods to sell to their groups, instead of continuing to try fighting a losing battle. I expect though we will just continue to see more appeals and opposition that will end up being rejected and succeed in doing nothing more than causing a delay of a few months.

Eli Yshai, Minister of Interior, announced that "the plan will create a significant increase in housing available to the broad public, and protected housing, in light of the severe shortage of housing in Israel. I intend to continue and advance plans for construction that will solve the housing crisis for all the citizens of Israel."


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9 comments:

  1. Spot on Rafi! I just wish the Dov Lipmans, Moti Cohen and other opposition activists would listen to you.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Its amazing how there is always money to buy up all of the land, but never money to pay arnona (80% discounts are not enough - our leadership raised it to 90%). And if you complain about paying extra and getting lower-quality services, that makes you a 'haredi-basher.'
    PS I have NO problem paying for genuinely poor people, rather than the voluntarily poor.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Those who oppose the neighborhoods due to the largely haredi population expected to move in might do better work if they tried to buy sections of the neighborhoods to sell to their groups

    I think part of the problem is that we (Dati Leumi) don't usually have "groups" per se. Sure there are a few small groups here and there that might move somewhere together en masse, but very few and very small, and usually to new settlements in various places, not so much to established cities. Charedim, on the other hand, have a huge advantage in that they their lives are more centrally planned. Basically, if the Rebbe chooses a place and tells 500 families to move there, they move there.

    ReplyDelete
  4. In addition, the spitters, the stoners and the cursers have managed to scare away quite a few non-haredim from Beit Shemesh so there is no 'competition.' In this sense, the Haredi leadership has it both ways - on the one hand, they say "we have no control over the extremists" and the other hand, these extremists "do the work" for the haredi leadership.
    Maybe this is why the haredi leadership (including our mayor) has not taken any action against the violent extremists, except for perfunctory statements in the non-haredi press condeming all violence. This all makes me doubt the sincerity of the condemnations and statements from the haredi leadership.
    Since the haredi population prides itself on not questioning their leadership, the Haredi leadership can get away with this (CLEARLY the majority of the haredi population does not support verbal or physical violence).
    Can you name one non-haredi city in their RIGHT MIND that would look at Beit Shemesh enviously, and wish they that more haredim moved into THEIR city??

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anon2, the protests scared away more people than any spitter. They BS anglos shot themselves in the foot by generating so much publicity.

    The sad part is that the dati leumi are not united into much at all. They thought that Elad would be 50-50, they are even building in Harish which will be another Elad.

    Anon1, the regular Chaimke is poor, but there is no shortage of contractors willing to spend money in order to take from Chaimke's father in law.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, but you just can't let Jewish little girls get abused and remain silent. One positive thing - without the protests, I am CERTAIN the Abutbul would have tried to take away the school from the girls. After all, he DID apply major pressure until the protests made this completely a non-option.
      Ironically, if someone HAS V'HALILA had done anything like this to haredi girls, their press would have blared "not since the 1930s has anything like this been done to Jewis girls" For the askanim and the haredi press (and frankly the mayor), non-haredim (especially dati leumi) are simply not Jews.

      Delete
  6. I am not trying to be critical of past attempts. what was tried was tried. so be it. I am just saying that it is time for a new approach. the old has failed too many times already.

    getting a group together doesnt mean get a bunch of like-minded people. it means put together attractive plans at good prices and advertise it in DL publications with good marketing script. young couples who are looking for good prices in a great part of the country will come.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Rafi, Maybe Dov Lipman can reply here as to why all the dati-leumi's efforts and money are being used to battle in the courts and not on creating big Dati-Leum building projects.

    ReplyDelete

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