Wall Games

Buoyed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's successful trip to the U.S., the Israeli government ordered the building of 22 homes in a settlement in the Gaza Strip, pushed through a law denying citizenship to Palestinians who marry Israelis — and completed the first phase of a $1 billion barrier that critics say will in effect turn the West Bank into a vast prison.

The construction ordered in the Neveh Dekalim settlement violated the U.S.-backed road map to peace, which requires Israel to freeze all settlement activity, but the government claimed the new homes were part of "natural growth" to accommodate an increasing population.

Earlier in the week, Sharon completed his visit to the U.S. without the widely anticipated reprimand for constructing the "security" barrier around the West Bank. He got away with no more than a slap on the wrist: Bush expressed concern about the barrier and, in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Maariv, U.S, Secretary of State Colin Powell warned it could undermine the road map.

But Sharon scored a victory of sorts in the White House: referring to the barrier in a joint press conference, President George W. Bush dropped the politically-loaded term "wall" he had used only the previous week, after a meeting with Palestinian leader Abu Mazen. After his confab with Sharon, Bush reverted to the neutral term preferred by the Israelis: "fence."