At least 500,000 Israelis live in territories won in the 1967 Six-Day War, and possibly a great deal more than that. They reside everywhere from cities to small towns to tiny hilltop outposts, and represent a diverse and complex society-within-a-society that is far more difficult to understand and describe than most outsiders realize.
Despite several setbacks, such as the 1982 evacuation of Yamit and the 2005 Gaza disengagement, the settlement movement has been, for the most part, a remarkable success story. Over the past five decades, it has gone from a loosely-organized non-governmental social phenomenon to a highly-institutionalized and politically-powerful voting bloc, one that is in equal measure loved, hated and feared by much of the rest of Israeli society.
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