I realised from the very first moment
that the settlements would bring disaster on the country.
The first settlement was Levinger's in Hebron.
Levinger, together with a small band of fanatics,
went and rented a few rooms in an Arab hotel in Hebron –
the Park Hotel if I'm not mistaken.
And the military government didn't stop him.
Nevertheless, religious Jews, Passover, a day or two, and they just stayed there, they didn't leave.
The criminal in this case is Yigal Allon – I think I have already talked about this.
Yigal Allon had an obsession from the time of the Six Day War,
a compulsion really,
a hatred of Moshe Dayan
who 'grabbed, stole' his position in the Ministry of Defence
at the last moment from right under him.
Levinger – accidentally, I don't think it was calculated −
did this thing after Moshe Dayan was injured in an archaeological accident.
He was digging an illegal excavation,
the earth collapsed on him, he was buried, rescued,
hospitalised, he could not speak at all for quite a while and then only in a whisper
until his voice returned.
And Yigal Allon saw a great opportunity. He ran to Hebron to Levinger to congratulate him,
to spread his patronage.
Really an abominable act, in my opinion −
although I was on friendly terms with Allon.
Then he stayed there and the military government moved the settlement into the military government building,
and then they settled near the Cave of the Patriarchs,
and later most of them were moved to a new settlement named Kiryat Arba.
Everything followed from that.
We saw from the start that this was going to turn into a real disaster.
Then came the story of Sebastia
that same group settled in some old Turkish or British train station.
Again all kinds of activists ran there to congratulate them,
and this was during the period when Rabin was Prime Minister
and Shimon Peres was Minister of Defence.
One of the biggest mistakes Rabin made was surrendering and bringing it before the government,
and this created a crisis.
These people settled there and no one dared to remove them,
certainly not Shimon Peres,
who was also a coward and probably thought he could take advantage of this and use it against Rabin.
Then came Haim Guri, my friend, who made a proposal,
suggested a compromise: to move this settlement from where it was −
and thus satisfy those demanding that it be removed altogether −
but move it to an old English camp in an Arab village called Kadum
which was worse than Sebastia because it was already in the heart of Samaria,
in the heart of the West Bank.
Everyone celebrated. Peres celebrated.
I neither spoke nor met with Rabin
so I don't know exactly how angry he was,
but he accepted it.
And so the settlements began,
and they swelled and swelled and swelled.