Palestinians call for action against illegal Israeli settlements

The Palestinian foreign ministry yesterday called for international action to impose sanctions on Israel over its settlement activities in the occupied West bank, PLS 48 reported.

In a statement, the ministry called for “dealing with settlement as a war crime that endangers international safety and security.” It also called for prosecuting Israeli officials over their “continuous crimes against the Palestinians, their land and state.”

PLS 48 said that the Israeli government approved building 243 new settlement units in the occupied West Bank in 2014 and annexed them. It also developed plans to build 270 new settlement units around the occupied West Bank.

In addition, the website said that Israeli Housing Minister Uri Ariel had given the green light to the expansion of the illegal settlement of Efrat south of Bethlehem, which was built on Palestinian land appropriated by Israeli settlers in 2009.

The ministry said that the Israeli settlement activities come in context of official Israeli plans to divide the occupied West Bank into “isolated cantons” and separating these cantons from occupied Jerusalem. Thus, Israel disunites Palestinian land aimed for the future Palestinian state.

Official statistics reported by PLS 48 showed the period between 2009 and 2014, when Benjamin Netanyahu served as Israeli prime minister. During this period, there was a 25 per cent increase in settlement construction and nine per cent increase in settlement numbers in the West Bank. About 600,000 settlers live in West Bank now.

The ministry warned that the Israeli right wing would exploit the Israeli elections to go increase measures to Judaise Jerusalem and confiscate land.

The PA has previously sought international condemnation and criminalisation of Israeli settlements, but it has always received cold responses.

BOX:

600,000

Israeli settlers live in illegal settlements in the occupied territories