Israel OK's Plans for Thousands of New Settlement Homes, Defying White House

This file photo shows a part of new housing projects in the West Bank Israeli settlement of Givat Ze'ev, Monday, June 18, 2023.
This file photo shows a part of new housing projects in the West Bank Israeli settlement of Givat Ze'ev, Monday, June 18, 2023.
TT
20

Israel OK's Plans for Thousands of New Settlement Homes, Defying White House

This file photo shows a part of new housing projects in the West Bank Israeli settlement of Givat Ze'ev, Monday, June 18, 2023.
This file photo shows a part of new housing projects in the West Bank Israeli settlement of Givat Ze'ev, Monday, June 18, 2023.

Israel’s far-right government on Monday approved plans to build thousands of new homes in Jewish settlements in the West Bank — a move that threatened to worsen increasingly strained relations with the United States.

The decision defied growing US criticism of Israel’s settlement policies. It also raised tensions with the Palestinians at a time of rising violence in the occupied territory.

Multiple Israeli media outlets said the Defense Ministry planning committee that oversees settlement construction approved over 5,000 new settlement homes. The units are at various stages of planning, and it was not immediately clear when construction would begin. The ministry did not immediately comment.

The international community, along with the Palestinians, considers settlement construction illegal or illegitimate and obstacles to peace. Over 700,000 Israelis now live in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem — territories captured by Israel in 1967 and sought by the Palestinians for a future state.

“The Netanyahu government is moving forward with its aggression and open war against the Palestinian people,” said Wassel Abu Yousef, a Palestinian official in the West Bank. “We affirm that all settler colonialism in all the occupied Palestinian territories is illegitimate and illegal.”

Israel’s government, which took office in late December, is dominated by religious and ultranationalist politicians with close ties to the settlement movement. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a firebrand settler leader, has been granted Cabinet-level authority over settlement policies and has vowed to double the settler population in the West Bank.

The Biden Administration has been increasingly outspoken in its criticism of Israel’s settlement policies. Earlier this month, Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the settlements “an obstacle to the horizon of hope we seek” in a speech to the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC.

Despite the criticism, the US has taken little action against Israel. In a sign of its displeasure, the White House has not yet invited Netanyahu for a visit – as is customary following Israeli elections.

And this week, the US said it would not transfer funds to Israeli institutions for science and technology research projects in the West Bank. The decision restored a longstanding policy that had been canceled by the pro-settlement Trump administration.

Ahead of Monday's vote, Israeli Cabinet Minister Issac Wasserlauf, a member of the far-right Jewish Power party, played down the disagreements with the US.

“I think the alliance with the US will remain,” he told the Army Radio station. “There are disagreements, we knew how to deal with them in the past.”

Simcha Rothman, another far-right member of the governing coalition, accused the Biden Administration of having a “pathological obsession” with the Israeli government.

Netanyahu’s government, the most right-wing in Israel’s 75-year history, has made settlement expansion its top priority.

Senior members have been pushing for increased construction and other measures to cement Israel’s control over the territory in response to a more than year-long wave of violence with the Palestinians. Last week, four Israelis were killed by a pair of Palestinian gunmen who opened fire next to a Jewish settlement.

Israel expanded its military activity in the West Bank in early 2022 in response to a series of deadly Palestinian attacks. Over 135 Palestinians have been killed in fighting in the West Bank and east Jerusalem this year. Roughly half of them were affiliated with armed groups, though Israel says that number is much higher. But Palestinian stone-throwers and people uninvolved in violence were also killed. Some 24 people have been killed in Palestinian attacks.

Israel captured the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians claim all three territories for a future independent state.

Israel has annexed east Jerusalem and claims it as part of its capital – a claim that is not internationally recognized. It says the West Bank is disputed territory whose fate should be determined through negotiations, while Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005. Two years later, the Hamas movement overran the territory.



Israeli Troops Deploy to New Corridor Across Southern Gaza

Smoke rises to the sky following Israeli bombardment in the Gaza Strip as seen from southern Israel, Friday, April 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)
Smoke rises to the sky following Israeli bombardment in the Gaza Strip as seen from southern Israel, Friday, April 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)
TT
20

Israeli Troops Deploy to New Corridor Across Southern Gaza

Smoke rises to the sky following Israeli bombardment in the Gaza Strip as seen from southern Israel, Friday, April 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)
Smoke rises to the sky following Israeli bombardment in the Gaza Strip as seen from southern Israel, Friday, April 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)

Israel said Saturday that troops have deployed to a newly established security corridor across southern Gaza to pressure the Hamas militant group.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday announced the new Morag Corridor and suggested it would cut off the southern city of Rafah, which Israel has ordered evacuated, from the rest of Gaza.
A military statement Saturday said troops with the 36th Division had been deployed in the corridor. It was not immediately clear how many had deployed or where exactly the corridor was located, The Associated Press reported. Morag is the name of a Jewish settlement that once stood between Rafah and Khan Younis, and Netanyahu suggested it would run between the cities.
Maps published by Israeli media showed the new corridor running the width of the narrow coastal strip from east to west.
Netanyahu said it would be “a second Philadelphi corridor,” referring to the Gaza side of the border with Egypt further south, which has been under Israeli control since last May.
Israel has also reasserted control over the Netzarim corridor that cuts off the northern third of Gaza, including Gaza City, from the rest of the strip. The Philadelphi and Netzarim corridors run from the Israeli border to the Mediterranean Sea.
“We are cutting up the strip, and we are increasing the pressure step by step, so that they will give us our hostages,” Netanyahu said Wednesday.
The latest announcement came shortly after a White House official confirmed that Netanyahu on Monday would again meet with President Donald Trump, their second meeting at the White House since Trump took office in January.
Last month, Israel shattered the ceasefire in Gaza with a surprise bombardment after trying to pressure Hamas to accept proposed new terms for the truce that had taken hold in January. The White House supported Israel's move.
Netanyahu’s defense minister said Israel would seize large areas of Gaza and add them to its so-called security zones.
Israel has pledged to escalate the war with Hamas until the militant group returns the remaining hostages taken in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack that sparked the war, disarms and leaves the territory.
Israel last month again halted all supplies of food, fuel and humanitarian aid to Gaza.