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Watchdog Says Israel Is Advancing Plans for Nearly 1,000 More Settler Homes in West Bank 

A picture taken from the outskirts of the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, shows construction cranes at Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish settlement in the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of Jerusalem on February 7, 2025. (AFP)
A picture taken from the outskirts of the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, shows construction cranes at Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish settlement in the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of Jerusalem on February 7, 2025. (AFP)
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Watchdog Says Israel Is Advancing Plans for Nearly 1,000 More Settler Homes in West Bank 

A picture taken from the outskirts of the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, shows construction cranes at Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish settlement in the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of Jerusalem on February 7, 2025. (AFP)
A picture taken from the outskirts of the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, shows construction cranes at Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish settlement in the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of Jerusalem on February 7, 2025. (AFP)

Israel issued a tender for the construction of nearly 1,000 additional settler homes in the occupied West Bank, an anti-settlement watchdog said Monday.

Peace Now says the development of 974 new housing units would allow the population of the Efrat settlement to expand by 40% and further block the development of the nearby Palestinian city of Bethlehem. Hagit Ofran, who leads the group's settlement monitoring, said construction can begin after the contracting process and issuing of permits, which could take another year at least.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories for their future state and view the settlements as a major obstacle to peace, a position with wide international support.

President Donald Trump lent unprecedented support to the settlements during his previous term. Israel has also steadily expanded settlements during Democratic administrations, which were more critical but rarely took any action to curb them.

Israel has built well over 100 settlements across the West Bank, ranging from hilltop outposts to fully-developed communities that resemble small towns and suburbs, with apartment blocks, malls and parks.

Over 500,000 settlers live in the occupied West Bank, which is home to some 3 million Palestinians. The settlers have Israeli citizenship, while Palestinians live under military rule with the Palestinian Authority administering population centers.

Major human rights groups have described the situation as apartheid, allegations rejected by the Israeli government, which views the West Bank as the historical and biblical heartland of the Jewish people and is opposed to Palestinian statehood.

Peace Now, which favors a negotiated two-state solution to the conflict, accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government of pressing ahead with settlement construction while dozens of hostages captured in Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attack languish in captivity in the Gaza Strip.

“While the people of Israel (set) their sights on the release of the hostages and an end to the war, the Netanyahu government is operating ‘on steroids’ to establish facts on the ground that will destroy the chance for peace and compromise,” it said in a statement.

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Arab World

Israeli Drone Strikes Near Beirut Kill 4 and Southern Airstrikes Kill at Least 13

People ride a scooter past a destroyed car that was targeted by an Israeli strike, in Saadiyat, Lebanon, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
People ride a scooter past a destroyed car that was targeted by an Israeli strike, in Saadiyat, Lebanon, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
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Israeli Drone Strikes Near Beirut Kill 4 and Southern Airstrikes Kill at Least 13

People ride a scooter past a destroyed car that was targeted by an Israeli strike, in Saadiyat, Lebanon, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
People ride a scooter past a destroyed car that was targeted by an Israeli strike, in Saadiyat, Lebanon, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir

Three Israeli drone strikes on vehicles just south of Beirut on Saturday killed four people while a series of airstrikes on southern Lebanon killed at least 13, state media and the Health Ministry said.

The three drone strikes south of Beirut marked another escalation since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah went into effect on April 17. Both Israel and Hezbollah have continued their daily attacks despite the truce.

On Wednesday night, Israel’s air force carried out an airstrike on a southern suburb in which Israel said it killed a senior Hezbollah military official. It was the first strike near the capital since the ceasefire was reached.

Two of the strikes on Saturday took place on the highway linking Beirut with the southern port city of Sidon in which several people were wounded, while the third happened on a road leading to Lebanon’s Chouf region killing three, the state-run National News Agency said.

An Associated Press journalist at the scene saw a dead body on the highway in the town of Saadiyat.

The Health Ministry said an Israeli airstrike on the southern village of Saksakiyeh killed at least seven, including a child, and wounded 15. The ministry said this was an initial count.

The agency reported strikes in southern Lebanon, including one on the village of Bourj Rahhal that killed three and another in Maifadoun that killed one.

The Health Ministry, meanwhile, said three Israeli drone strikes killed a Syrian man who was riding a motorcycle with his 12-year-old daughter in the city of Nabatiyeh.

The ministry said that after the initial strike, the man and his daughter managed to move away from the site only to be attacked again by the drone instantly killing the man. The girl then moved about 100 meters (yards) away and was hit again by the drone after she had been already wounded. The girl later died in a hospital, NNA said.

 

Residents search for survivors through the rubble of houses damaged by an Israeli airstrike in the village of Saksakieh, south Lebanon, Saturday, May 9, 2026. A car is seen damaged at the site. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)

 

“The Ministry of Public Health denounces this barbaric targeting and the deliberate violence against civilians and children in Lebanon,” the ministry said in its statement added that the strike marks an ongoing series “of grave violations of International Humanitarian Law.”

The Israeli military said Hezbollah fired explosive drones into Israel near the border with Lebanon adding that three soldiers were wounded, one of them seriously, in one of the attacks. It added that Hezbollah fired drones inside Lebanon as well in which one hit an Israeli vehicle without inflicting casualties.

Hezbollah claimed several attacks inside Lebanon as well as firing a drone at an Israeli military post in the northern town of Misgav Am.

Arab World

Syria President Discusses Security with Visiting Lebanon PM

Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in Damascus in 2025 (File photo: AFP)
Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in Damascus in 2025 (File photo: AFP)
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Syria President Discusses Security with Visiting Lebanon PM

Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in Damascus in 2025 (File photo: AFP)
Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in Damascus in 2025 (File photo: AFP)

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa met Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in Damascus on Saturday on a visit tackling issues including security, transport and energy.

Beirut and Damascus have been rebuilding their ties after the December 2024 overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in Syria, whose family dynasty exercised control over Lebanese affairs for decades and is accused of assassinating numerous officials in Lebanon who expressed opposition to its rule.

A statement from the Syrian presidency said the officials discussed "developing economic and trade cooperation... and bolstering security coordination in order to support stability and confront challenges", as well as regional and international developments, AFP reported.

Syrian state news agency SANA said the visit aimed to "develop joint cooperation... particularly the economy, transportation and energy" sectors.

Salam was accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister Tarek Mitri as well as Lebanese ministers for energy, economy and transport.

Salam hailed "significant progress" on joint issues at the end of the visit, telling reporters that "we discussed continuing efforts to address the issue of detained Syrians (in Lebanon) and to uncover the fate of the missing and forcibly detained in both countries".

In March, Lebanon transferred more than 130 Syrian convicts to their home country to serve the remainder of their sentences there, as part of an agreement signed a month earlier.

Lebanon has also been seeking information on political assassinations in the country under the Assad dynasty.

The discussions also addressed "the need for stricter Syria-Lebanon border controls and preventing all types of smuggling", Salam added.

Lebanon and Syria share a porous, 330-kilometre (205-mile) border notorious for the smuggling of people and goods.

Last month, the main border crossing was closed for several days due to an Israeli threat to target it, with Israel accusing Hezbollah of using the crossing for military purposes and smuggling, though it ultimately did not carry out the strike.

Israel and Hezbollah have been fighting since the Iran-backed group drew Lebanon into the Middle East war with rocket fire at Israel on March 2, though a ceasefire was announced last month.

Hezbollah, which fought alongside Syrian government forces during the country's civil war, lost a major ally and cross-border supply route with Assad's ouster.

Syria's new authorities are hostile to the Lebanese group and its sponsor, and have announced the arrest of alleged Hezbollah-affiliated cells in recent months, while the group has denied having any presence in Syria.

Salam said that "we will not allow Lebanon to be used as a platform to harm any of its Arab brothers, including Syria".

Arab World

Settlers Force Re-burial of Palestinian Man in West Bank, Family Says 

Israeli settlement structuers being installed in Sanur near Jenin, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman
Israeli settlement structuers being installed in Sanur near Jenin, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman
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Settlers Force Re-burial of Palestinian Man in West Bank, Family Says 

Israeli settlement structuers being installed in Sanur near Jenin, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman
Israeli settlement structuers being installed in Sanur near Jenin, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, May 9, 2026. REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman

Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank forced Palestinians to exhume the body of their father from his freshly dug village grave, his family said, near a settlement re-established by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government.

Hussein Asasa, 80, died on Friday of natural causes and was buried that evening at the cemetery of Asasa village near Jenin, with all the necessary permits from Israel's military, whose forces were at the site, his son Mohammed said.

But shortly after the burial, the family was called back by some of the villagers, who said settlers were at the grave, ordering the grave be dug up.

"They said the land was for settlement and that burial was not allowed. We told them that this is the village's cemetery, not part of the settlement," said Asasa, Reuters reported.

The settlers then threatened to dig the grave up with a bulldozer, Asasa said, so the family decided to exhume their father's body themselves.

"We found that they already dug the grave and reached the body," Asasa said. "We continued digging and got the body and buried him in another cemetery," he said.

VIDEO SHOWS PEOPLE REMOVING A BODY

Video circulating on social media appeared to show settlers watching as people dig in the ground of a hill slope. They then carry away what looks like a body as Israeli troops walk behind them. Reuters verified the location as Asasa.

The Israeli military said that the funeral had been coordinated with it and that it had not instructed the family to rebury their father. Soldiers were sent to the scene following a report about a confrontation with settlers who were "digging in the area," the military said. "The soldiers confiscated digging tools from the Israeli civilians and remained at the location in order to prevent further friction," the military said. It added that it condemns actions that violate the "dignity of the living and the deceased".

The UN Human Rights Office condemned the incident.

"This is appalling and emblematic of the dehumanisation of Palestinians that we see unfolding across the OPT (Occupied Palestinian Territories). It spares no one, dead or alive," said Ajith Sunghay, head of the OHCHR Palestinian office.

Sa-Nur was one of 19 settlements evacuated under the 2005 Israeli disengagement plan, which also included Israel's withdrawal of settlers and troops from Gaza. Netanyahu's government approved Sa-Nur's re-establishment a year ago and construction has advanced rapidly, according to Peace Now, an Israeli settlement watchdog.

The West Bank is among the territories that Palestinians seek for an independent state. Israel cites historical and biblical ties to the land, as well as security needs.

Netanyahu's government, which staunchly opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state, has been accelerating settlement building, while a rise in attacks by settlers on Palestinians has drawn international alarm. The United Nations and most countries deem Israel's settlements on West Bank land captured in the 1967 war illegal, a view that Israel disputes.