Yesterday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office ordered 12 outposts in Judea and Samaria be connected to the state’s official power grid. Aside from the fact that this move is long over due, it is also seen as Netanyahu’s latest gesture to the Jewish community there just 8 days before the March 2 elections.
Director-General of the Prime Minister’s Office, Ronen Peretz, wrote in a letter to the Defense Ministry’s adviser on settlement affairs, Avi Roeh, that the dozen hilltop communities handpicked for the upgrade “were established many years ago on [what is considered] state land, often times with the government’s encouragement and out of security considerations.”