المكتب الوطني للدفاع عن الارض ومقاومة الاستيطان منظمة التحرير الفلسطينية
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By: Madeeha Al-A’raj
The National Bureau for defending land and resisting settlements ( nbprs ) stated in its latest weekly report , that Higher Planning Committee of the so-called Civil Administration at the occupation army has approved recently the construction of 4,427 new settlement housing units in the occupied West Bank, where it gave final approval for the construction of 2,791 units, while it initially approved the construction of 1,636 units, where America colludes with the Bennett-Lapid-Gantz government at the expense of international law, international legitimacy resolutions and the rights of the Palestinian people, knowing that about 700,000 Israeli settlers live in settlementsconsidered as illegal under international law.
As for new settlement plans, about 1,452 housing units to be approved to be constructed in the following settlements: Nokdim, 32 units, Ma’ale Adumim 16 units, Kdomim 286 units, Dolev 90 units, Emmanuel 170 units, Mavo Horon 110 units, Shaarei Tikva 192 units, Elkanah 500 units and Nagohot 56 units. Finalapproval was also given to 2,536 housing units in the following settlements, Dolev 364 units, Ma’aleh Makhmash 114 units, Shivut Rachel 534 units, Nerea 168 units, Givat Ze’ev 136 units, Efrat 40 units, Tsofim 92 units, Rivava 64 units, Tel Menashe 107 units, Betar Illit 761 units, Kiryat Arba 156 units.
Despite that, settlers claim that the number of housing units approved today has decreased, and that the construction of about 1,800 more housing units in the settlements was not discussed. For her part, Interior Minister of the far-right Yamina party, Ayelet Shaked saidthat the day the settlement plan is approved represents a ‘celebratory day for the settlement movement.’ The Hebrew Channel 7 reported that the council was supposed to approve 1,800 additional units, but US President, John Biden asked the Israeli prime minister to reduce the number of units.
The Israeli government wasn’t shocked by the objection of the US’s statements to build about four thousand settlement units in the West Bank, especially as a long discussions took place between American and Israeli circles, after which the Israeli political level decided to reduce the number of settlement units from about 5800 to about 4,427 to be established most of which inside the settlement blocs, and the Americans were told that the implementation of these settlement projects is necessary in order to
The American complicity with the Israel in passing the settlement lans is no longer a secret. It was revealed by the Israeli media, especially the widespread newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, which confirmed that the United States of America accepted an Israeli offer to reduce the number of housing units to be built in the occupied Palestinian West Bank settlements from over 6,000 units to 4,000 units, on the verge of a planned visit by US President Biden to the region. It is as if the Israeli settlements a commodity that could be bargained and argued about, and made legitimate and legal if their number was reduced.
It is a shameful American denial of international law and resolutions of international legitimacy including resolution n. 2334 issued by the UN Security Council in 2016 at the end of the president Barack Obama’s term in office, where Biden was his deputy. Israel requested and the American administration responded in order to preserve the stability of a crumbling and toppled Israeli government without giving any attention for international legitimacy, international law and the rights of the Palestinian people.
Within a related context, the Israeli occupation government approved the 5th plan for new settlement projects on the lands of Lifta al-Fawqa and Deir Yassin in West Jerusalem. The project comes in implementation of the decisions of the political level and the Jerusalem Committee headed by Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett without taking into account the Green Line separating the Palestinian territories occupied in 1948 and the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967.
Under the main plan, a settlement complex and an industrial zone will be built in the Givat Shaul settlement on the lands of the villages of Lifta and Deir Yassin. The project plan includes building 2 towers of up to 24 floors that will combine settlement housing, employment and affordable housing. The structural plan comes as a major expansion of the settlement of Givat Shaul built on the lands of the 2 villages, in which it was decided to add 700 housing units in the compounds that were defined as ‘entry gates’ to the industrial zone.
List of Israeli Assaults over the Last Week Documented by the National Bureau:
Jerusalem:
- Breaking glass and punctured tires of Palestinian vehicles in Sheikh Jarrah.
- Attacking a 14-year-old boy from the Silwan town near the Ma’man Allah Cemetery
- Demolishing a residential building in Silwan, displacing about 40 members of the Rajabi family who live there, and demolishing a commercial office in the Jabal Mukaber town.
- Forcing the al-Salaymeh family to demolish their home in the Ashkariya neighborhood of Beit Hanina, under the pretext of building without a permit. They also demolished a house under construction in the village of al-Isawiya.
Bethlehem:
- Building a settlement road, east of Wadi Fukin village, with a length of 300 meters.Placing barbed wire on both sides of the road adjacent to the settlement of “Tzur Hadassah”, and razing 22 dunums of land in the village of Al-Jab’a, between the villages of Al-Jab’a and Surif.
- Bulldozing large areas of the lands of the Al-Khela area in the village of Wadi Fukin.
Nablus:
- Attacking Jamal Barham Hamayel, from the town of Beita, while he was in the Ain Umm al-Jarb area. Settlers from ‘Bracha’ settlement attacked the homes of citizens in Burin, and threw stones at them.
- Storming the site of the evacuated “Homash” settlement, south of Jenin.
- Demolishing a greenhouse ‘plastic house’, in the town of Forush Beit Dajan, under the pretext that it was located in ‘firing zones’. Occupation bulldozers demolished 2 houses under construction in the town of Beit Dajan, east of Nablus, each consisting of 2 floors, under the pretext of building in areas C.
- Uprooting about 110 olive seedlings from the lands of Saneria northwest of Nablus.
Salft:
- Uprooting a number of olive trees and breaking about 30 trees in the “Qasari area” and “Arara” north of the town
- Wounding Osama Ayed Ibdah, 50 from the village of Marda, and the windows of his vehicle were smashed.
- Uprooting and breaking 17 olive plantations and sabotaging an agricultural room north of the Kafr ad-Dik town, aged between 4-6 years, and sabotaging an agricultural room in the Khirbet Susiya area north of the town.
Jordan Valley:
- Plowing lands near the people’s tents in Khirbat al-Farisiya in the northern Jordan Valley to establish vital facilities and schools in the area.
- Demolishing 2 residential rooms under construction in Khirbet Einun, east of Tubas, with an estimated area of 100m2, under the pretext of not having a license.
- A pool with a capacity of 1,000 cubic meters of water was destroyed in the village of Marj Na’ja, in the Jordan Valley.
