Israeli TV will advertise cheap West Bank housing

Israeli state television will soon begin screening advertisements offering young couples cheap housing on the Israeli-occupied West Bank, a broadcasting-authority spokesman said.

In the past year a number of private contractors have joined government companies in building several new suburbs there within easy commuting distance of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Israeli officials expect the current Jewish West Bank population of 20,000 (among 850,000 Palestinians) to double within a few months, when houses under construction have been completed.

Former Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, in a just-published, jointly written article for Reader's Digest, say Israel's policy of continuing to build settlements on occupied Arab lands is the major obstacle to Mideast peace.