The court-ordered evacuation of the illegal Amona outpost in the West Bank (scheduled for Dec. 25 at the latest), and the proposed outpost Regularization law, are wars of yesteryear — limited skirmishes that divert attention from a far greater and more important war. The new battleground was inaugurated at the height of the battle for Amona and the imbroglio over the controversial bill granting legal status to wildcat West Bank outposts.

Giant billboards displaying the portraits of late President Shimon Peres, late Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin, Ariel Sharon and Menachem Begin, and former Prime Minister Ehud Barak have in recent weeks augured the impending clash. The clever campaign slogan says “following in their footsteps.” Next to the portrait of each leader is a citation advocating the annexation of the settlement town of Ma’ale Adumim to Israel. For example, Sharon pledged that “Ma’ale Adumim will be built as part of the State of Israel for ever more.” A petition, website, Facebook page, rally and especially pressure running across party lines have all been mobilized to promote a diplomatic measure the likes of which Israel has not undertaken since annexing the Golan Heights in 1981. The Knesset’s Land of Israel lobby, the settlement umbrella organization Yesha Council and the pro-settlement Regavim Movement have all joined forces with Benny Kashriel, the three-term mayor of Ma’ale Adumim and a veteran Likud Party politico, in a bid to push through legislation at the Knesset’s winter session imposing Israeli sovereignty over the town.

At a rally in late October, Welfare and Social Services Minister Haim Katz, the chairman of the Likud Central Committee, pledged to do everything possible to ensure that Israeli sovereignty is applied in Ma’ale Adumin. Knesset member David Bitan of the Likud, the chairman of the ruling coalition, announced, “We will do it despite all the international problems and US pressure. We shouldn’t be at all scared.” Kashriel issued the following appeal to the government and its members: “If almost 80% of the people of Israel [according to a survey conducted by pollsters Mano Geva and Mina Tzemach] call on you to impose sovereignty, you have to listen to them. There is no reason not to impose sovereignty and [not] to begin building.”

But behind the call for Israeli sovereignty over the settlement on the edges of the Green Line — a move that in itself has massive explosive potential in the regional and international arena — is a hidden, lethal booby trap. It is known as the E1 zone, a West Bank area under the municipal jurisdiction of Ma’ale Adumim, located adjacent to and northeast of East Jerusalem and to the west of Ma'ale Adumim. According to the town’s website, the municipal jurisdiction was recently expanded westward toward Jerusalem and spans 48,000 dunams (11,861 acres), and this place already has a name: Mevaseret Adumim. The website reads, “This area includes the E1 zone — the neighborhood of Mevaseret Adumim, destined for tourism development, the construction of a particularly high-end residential compound of 3,500 units, and a commercial and employment area.”