Jerrold Kessel: A new Mideast barrier

CNN's Jerrold Kessel

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Israel broke ground Sunday on a 217-mile-long fence along its border with the West Bank, angering Palestinians and some Israelis.

CNN correspondent Jerrold Kessel talked Monday with CNN anchor Daryn Kagan about the new barrier.

KESSEL: It is strange how something which doesn't really exist can create such a commotion, such a fuss, create such antagonism, so much opposition. And that something, of course, is what is known as the fence that Israel has begun.

The groundbreaking work began formally [Sunday] in the northern part of the West Bank and Israel along that frontier for this fence, which will be built roughly along the Israel-West Bank border.

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And I am not strictly speaking only of a fence, because there will be a melange of obstacles, including a very tall wall in some places near where Palestinian towns are right alongside that border between Israel and the West Bank. Also ditches, also patrol roads, also electronic surveillance devices, all coming together in what the Israelis are calling a fence along the West Bank-Israel border.

This has become almost a political imperative in Israeli politics, as each time a suicide bomber gets through, the public demand for such an obstacle, a barrier, increases. And that has led to the fact that this fence is now becoming a political reality.

But there is something more than the fence. ... That is the conception [that] perhaps this is the first stage of what the Israelis call unilateral separation from the Palestinians. That could be what's causing the fuss among the right-wing opponents, who don't want this to be a political fence, a political border in the future.

CNN: Jerrold, it's interesting the ... people who are against this, not only the conservative Israelis, as you pointed out, but also Palestinians. The basic issue on both sides: [They're] not happy with the line that this fence draws, and what that could lead to in the future in deciding territory.

KESSEL: Yes, exactly that. As I say, the right wingers hope this won't be a political line down the future, which will mean that Israel will either weaken its hold or its determination to hold onto the West Bank and Gaza, where there is already a fence around the whole of Gaza.

And among Palestinians, they say it won't work. It means Israel is annexing more territory. It means Israel is turning its back on the possibility of living alongside Palestinians, deciding what it wants to do on its own, and that will only create further antagonism.

So [there's] a good deal of opposition to this, but among the Israeli public, a great deal of support for this, a determination it will be built. And for that reason, it seems as if it will go ahead after all.