Media reports in Israel have revealed plans for a new scheme to link a number of illegal settlements in the West Bank with the city of Petah Tikva in the part of Palestine taken by Israel in 1948. According to Haaretz, the Israeli Ministry of Transport is looking at plans to build a railway linking all of the settlements near the occupied West Bank towns of Nablus, Qalqilya and Safit with the city which started life as a Jewish settlement at the end of the nineteenth century.
The Minister of Transport, Israel Katz, has instructed staff to prepare plans for the railway and is already seeking approval from the Defence Minister, Ehud Barak, as this project falls under his “competent authority” with regards to settlement affairs.