Reply #21: It Has Certainly Been Effective, Sir, No Question.

[The Magistrate]

Certainly from the Israeli point of view, it has been a pretty good thing, and overall, anything that reduces the number killed is in my view to the good of everyone involved. You will not find me condemning it, or demanding it be dismantled forthwith.

But there is no question, either, that it represents a de facto annexation of everything lying between it and the Armistice Line. Declarations this is temporary do not move me much; in this conflict the temporary has a way of hardening into permanence down the years. The announcement, when its building was commenced, that the regulations for 'absentee owners' that had been employed shortly after '48 would be applied, hardly was encouraging.