Israel approves 19 new Jewish settlements in occupied West Bank

Israel has approved a proposal for 19 new Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank as the government pushes ahead with a construction binge in the territory that poses a further threat to the possibility of a Palestinian state.It brings the total number of new settlements over the past few years to 69, a new record, according to the far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who has pushed a settlement expansion agenda in the West Bank. The latest include two that were previously evacuated during a 2005 disengagement plan.The approval by the security cabinet increases the number of settlements in the West Bank by nearly 50% during the current government’s tenure. In 2022, there were 141 settlements across the West Bank. After the latest approval there are 210, according to Peace Now, an anti-settlement watchdog group.Settlements are considered illegal under international law.The approval comes as the US pushes Israel and Hamas to move ahead with the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire, which took effect on 10 October. The US-brokered plan calls for a possible “pathway” to a Palestinian state, something the settlements are aimed at preventing.The cabinet decision included a retroactive legalisation of some previously established settlement outposts or neighbourhoods of existing settlements, and the creation of settlements on land where Palestinians had been evacuated, the finance ministry said. Settlements can range in size from a single dwelling to a collection of high-rises.The ministry said two of the settlements legalised in the latest approval were Kadim and Ganim, which were two of the four West Bank settlements dismantled in 2005 as part of Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. There have been multiple attempts to resettle them after Israel’s government in March 2023 repealed a 2005 act that evacuated the four outposts and barred Israelis from re-entering the areas.Israel captured the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza – areas claimed by the Palestinians for a future state – in the 1967 war. It has settled more than 500,000 Jews in the West Bank, in addition to more than 200,000 in contested East Jerusalem.Israel’s government is dominated by far-right proponents of the settler movement, including Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, the security minister.Settler expansion has been compounded by a surge of attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank in recent months. During October’s olive harvest, settlers across the territory launched an average of eight attacks each day, the most since the UN humanitarian office began collecting data in 2006. The attacks continued in November, with the UN recording at least 136 more by 24 November.Settlers burned cars, desecrated mosques, ransacked industrial plants and destroyed cropland. Israeli authorities have done little beyond issuing occasional condemnations of the violence.The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah said two Palestinians, including a 16-year-old, were killed in clashes with Israel’s military on Saturday night in the northern part of the West Bank.Israel’s military said a militant was shot and killed after he threw a block at troops in Qabatiya, and that another militant was killed after he hurled explosives at troops operating in the village of Silat al-Harithiya.The Palestinian health ministry identified the Palestinian killed in Qabatiya as 16-year-old Rayan Abu Muallah. Palestinian media aired brief security footage of the incident, where the youth appears to emerge from an alley and is shot by troops as he approaches them without throwing anything. Israel’s military said the incident was under review.The health ministry identified the second man as Ahmad Ziyoud, 22.Israel’s military has scaled up military operations in the West Bank since the 7 October 2023 Hamas-led attack that triggered the war in Gaza.