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Israel army to confiscate Palestinian land for new settlement bypass road

April 25, 2019 at 11:43 am

A general view of a Jewish settlement in the West Bank on 27 August 2018 [Shadi Hatem/Apaimages]

Israeli occupation authorities will confiscate Palestinian land in order to build a new road connecting illegal settlements in the southern occupied West Bank, reported the Jerusalem Post.

According to the report, the so-called bypass road will expand Road 60 that links the Gush Etzion settlement junction with the Kiryat Arba settlement in Hebron.

Settlement watchdog NGO Peace Now provided the paper with a copy of a land confiscation order signed by Israeli occupation authorities on 3 April, for a seven kilometre stretch of the new road.

Work on the road could begin as early as this summer.

Peace Now stated that the 401 dunams (99 acres) of Palestinian land from the towns of Beit Ommar and Halhul will be confiscated for the road construction.

“This expropriation is part of the government’s continued capitulation to the settlers, who want to build bypass roads throughout the West Bank,” Peace Now stated.

READ: More than 19,000 illegal settlement units built in Netanyahu era

“The settlers know very well that without good roads, the settlements will not be able to develop – but they demand that they be built ‘for security reasons’.”

The NGO added that the bypass roads have nothing to do with so-called “security” reasons, but rather are intended to “expand the settlements and advance the annexation of the territories”.