Knesset speaker urges return to evacuated settlements in northern West Bank

The Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein has urged the government to return settlers to evacuated settlements in the northern occupied West Bank, reported the Jerusalem Post.

Edelstein made the remarks yesterday during a visit by ten parliamentarians to the site of Homesh, whose settlers were removed in 2005 as part of the unilateral “disengagement” plan.

A number of Israeli politicians have vowed to repeal the Disengagement Law, facilitating the return of settlers to the four settlements dismantled in the northern West Bank. The Union of Right-Wing Parties, for example, “has made the law’s repeal one of its coalition demands”.

“It will be our mission in the 21st Knesset to repeal this legislation,” Edelstein said. “I think we will find more than a little support for this initiative”.

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As reported by the Jerusalem Post, senior settler official Yossi Dagan said that, “thirty out of the 35 Likud parliamentarians support a repeal law [for disengagement], as do a majority of the ministers”, adding that “the ball is in [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s hands”.

According to one member of yesterday’s delegation, “Israel is now enjoying international support of its claims of sovereignty over the West Bank”, likely a reference to rumours about the contents of the Trump administration’s so-called “deal of the century”.

Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din, who has supported Palestinian landowners in a thus far unsuccessful bid to restore their access to their lands at the former settlements, said the politicians who visited Homesh yesterday promote “annexation” and an “apartheid” regime.

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More Israeli settlements in Palestine – Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]