Israel punishes Palestinian Authority by freezing construction projects in the West Bank

An officer of Israel’s occupation forces has revealed that political motivations are behind Israel’s recent decision to freeze 19 Palestinian construction projects in the West Bank, saying that this is an effort to impose sanctions on the Palestinian Authority for seeking to join UN organisations and conventions, Israel’s Maariv newspaper reported on Sunday.

During a special committee meeting in parliament, Israel’s coordinator of government activities in the occupied Palestinian territories, Major General Yoav Mordechai, was quoted as saying that, “Master construction plans for the Palestinian populations have been frozen as a response to [President] Mahmoud Abbas’s overtures to the UN organisations.”

Israel directly controls Area C of the occupied West Bank and the government has insisted that construction permits are issued based on the decision of planning experts; however, the occupation authorities have instituted a politicised bureaucracy that discriminates against Palestinians, making it very difficult for them to secure any such building permits even when international organisations are backing the projects.

Now, Israel plans to make it impossible for Palestinian to build legally, cancelling the 19 previously approved projects and stopping any future construction projects as well, a policy that is based solely on political considerations.