The Israeli government is moving forward with a plan for the massive expansion of illegal Jewish settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank that would cut off the northern part of the Palestinian territory from its southern regions, a plan Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said will “bury the idea of a Palestinian state.”
Smotrich, who also holds a position in the Defense Ministry that allows him to expand settlements, announced that he plans to approve the construction of 3,401 housing units for the controversial E1 settlement project, which has been frozen for decades due to international opposition.
“They will talk about a Palestinian dream, and we will continue to build a Jewish reality,” Smotrich said at a press conference at the site of the planned construction. “This reality is what will permanently bury the idea of a Palestinian state, because there is nothing to recognize and no one to recognize.”
In an earlier statement, Smotrich said, “After decades of international pressure and freezes, we are breaking conventions and connecting Ma’ale Adumim to Jerusalem. This is Zionism at its best – building, settling, and strengthening our sovereignty in the Land of Israel.”
The announcement appears to be Smotrich’s response to several Western countries, including the UK, France, Canada, and Australia, announcing plans to recognize a Palestinian state by September if certain conditions are met.
The Israeli settlement watchdog Peace Now said the Israeli government’s Higher Planning Council is set to hold a hearing next Wednesday, August 20, for the final approval of the settlement construction. The group said the hearing was scheduled at “record speed.”
“The E1 plan is deadly for the future of Israel and for any chance of achieving a peaceful two-state solution. We are standing at the edge of an abyss, and the government is driving us forward at full speed,” Peace Now said in a statement.
“There is a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to the terrible war in Gaza — the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel — and it will ultimately come. The government’s annexation moves are taking us further away from this solution and guaranteeing many more years of bloodshed,” the group added.
The news was also strongly condemned by Palestinian officials. The presidency of the Palestinian National Council said the settlement expansion was a “systemic plan to steal land, Judaize it, and impose biblical and Talmudic facts on the conflict.”
