Israel approves over $400m to fund 34 settlements in occupied West Bank
The Israeli government announced on Tuesday that it had approved a budget of approximately 1.3bn shekels ($434m) to fund the establishment of 34 new settlements in the occupied West Bank.
According to Israeli news outlet Ynet, the decision was made by the security cabinet in June but kept under wraps over concerns about the US response.
The cabinet had separately approved the establishment of the 34 settlements in March, but the decision was not publicly announced until Tuesday.
The latest approval brings the number of settlements authorised under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's current government to 104 since it took office in late 2022, Ynet reported.
The government also approved the re-establishment of the settlement of Sa-Nur in the northern West Bank, months after Israeli settlers returned to the site, which had been evacuated in 2005 during Israel's disengagement from the Gaza Strip.
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Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also oversees civilian affairs in the occupied West Bank within the Defence Ministry, welcomed the decision.
He described it as "the cornerstone of the settlement revolution that we have been leading in recent years".
He called the move "a significant security-strategic decision", saying it formed part of "a broad move whose purpose is to kill the terrible idea of establishing a terror state in the very heart of the State of Israel" - referring to the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Smotrich said the measures, which he initiated and Netanyahu approved, were intended to accelerate settlement expansion across the occupied territory.
"We are passing, one after the other, budgetary decisions that fund roads, infrastructure, and now also buildings and caravans," he said, adding that construction of the new settlements would begin "this coming summer".
Settlement Minister Orit Strook also praised the decision, calling it "the greatest Zionist-settlement move since the establishment of the state".
Strook, who lives in an Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank and is a member of Smotrich's Religious Zionist party, said there had "not yet been a Zionist-settlement decision of such magnitude in the entire history of Zionism".
She added that the government was ensuring that "no point remains without a settlement" in the occupied West Bank.
Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are considered illegal under international law, a position upheld by the International Court of Justice and the overwhelming majority of the international community.
Annexation
The latest expansion comes amid what Smotrich has repeatedly described as a "settlement revolution" in the occupied West Bank.
Earlier this week, Smotrich and Netanyahu signed an umbrella agreement with the Samaria Regional Council, pledging 8.5bn shekels ($2.5bn) to expand infrastructure in the northern West Bank.
According to Israel Hayom, it was the first time an Israeli government had signed such an agreement with a regional council.
The deal allocates funding for 18 new settlements previously approved by the government, as well as the construction of around 12,000 homes in existing settlements and upgrades to surrounding infrastructure.
Peace Now, an Israeli anti-settlement watchdog, described the agreement as "a fire sale of the State of Israel".
"Not only is the government thumbing its nose at millions of Israelis and plundering their money for the benefit of a narrow settler sector - it is digging, with its own hands, the diplomatic and security pit in which the State of Israel may end up buried," the group said in a statement.
Earlier this month, Peace Now published a report arguing that the current Israeli government has accelerated the de facto annexation of the occupied West Bank.
According to the report, the government has approved more than 100 new settlements and established 185 settlement outposts over the past three years.
The outposts now control more than 1.1 million dunams of land - around 18 percent of the occupied West Bank - while Israeli settlers and the military have displaced 118 Palestinian communities, it said.
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