On Wednesday, a local Israeli committee advanced plans to construct over 3,500 new settler homes in occupied East Jerusalem.
According to the anti-settlement Israeli NGO Peace Now, some of the planned settler homes would largely cut off East Jerusalem from the southern part of the West Bank. The construction would further complicate plans for a future Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as the capital.
A total of 1,465 homes would be built in southern East Jerusalem, and 2,092 would be built near Mount Scopus in northeast East Jerusalem. The plan still needs to be passed through a higher-level committee for final approval, and construction likely won’t begin for a few years. But once the approval process begins, it is hard to stop, according to Peace Now.
Israeli settlement expansion has slowed since President Biden, but that is only compared to the spike in settlements advancement during the final year of the Trump administration. In 2020, Israel advanced plans for 12,159 settler housing units in the West Bank, the highest recorded in one year since Peace Now began keeping track in 2012.
Israel’s settlement expansion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem has made a two-state solution no longer a realistic option. The Israelis also have no interest in negotiating a peace deal with the Palestinians. On Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said there will be no talks with the Palestinians under the current coalition government.
“The construction would further complicate plans for a future Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as the capital.”
Plans? Sure, ok.
“Israeli settlement expansion has slowed since President Biden, but that is only compared to the spike in settlement advancement during the final year of the Trump administration.”
This is what is construed as being hard on Israel. Not kissing ass quite as much as the last guy.
Just give it up. One-state-solution has won.
Now it is about civil rights for victims of apartheid. The rest does not matter anymore.
Yes,it is time for the Arab nations to make things right with all the Jewsih peoples they evicted from their homes.
I would like to see all the stakeholders building homes in Jerusalem.
Illegal occupation and confiscation.
Yes, the way Egypt evicted its Jewish citizens in 1956.
Any Israeli claims of aspirations for a just peace are belied by the ongoing colonization. Only expulsion from the UN can even possibly end it. I go back and forth on sanctions and even outright blockades because those would unavoidably harm Israeli civilians. Perhaps a more direct application of international law, the ICC issuing warrants for Israeli leaders for their crimes, would be effective, though they would just not leave Israeli territory, so maybe not. What a shitty world. Hope everyone is doing well on a personal level. Sigh….
When Arafat send his minions to murder civilians,where was the ICC?Where is the ICC when China shoots people to harvest their organs for Sale?
Arafat died before the state of Palestine placed itself under ICC jurisdiction. Since the state of Israel has never done so either, no crimes committed in Palestine or Israel at that time would have been under ICC jurisdiction.
Since the state of Palestine ratified the Rome Statute, crimes committed by Palestinian state actors in Israel would now be under ICC jurisdiction, as would crimes committed in Palestine by actors of any state, including Israel.
China is not an ICC member state, either.
As I have stated directly to you before, I am highly critical of the status quo in the UN. The veto power is a ludicrous tool, and has been used to stymie any attempt at accountability for all sides. Note as well your failure to acknowledge as always that the colonization of the West Bank makes peace impossible.