Israel to Double Up on Unlawful Settlements in West Bank Occupation

Summary of Peace Now’s special report “New Land Seizure Orders Issued During the Gaza Operation” [.pdf].

2 Mar 09 | Americans for Peace Now

A New Peace Now Report Reveals: The Ministry of Construction and Housing is planning to construct at least 73,300 housing units in the West Bank

An examination of the data available on the Israeli government Website reveals that in plans for the West Bank at least:

• 15,000 housing units have already been approved; and
• plans for an additional 58,000 housing units are yet to be approved.

It is clear that the settlement’s supporters in the Likud Party and other possible coalition parties are awaiting their entrance into the new government’s Housing and Construction Ministry so to implement many of these plans. A real danger lies ahead of the new right wing government expanding settlement growth at a rapid pace, through these already approved (yet frozen) plans, with the clear intention of destroying the possibility of a Two State Solution.

REPORT FINDINGS

Peace Now has compiled a unique report based on this data, in addition these plans published are only a small part of the overall housing plans for the Occupied Territories, there are other thousands of housing units in plans of the local authorities, private initiators and other public authorities, all of which we are in the process of collating. For the full details of the report with maps and aerial photos go HERE.

Main findings:

• Total number of housing units in the published plans – 73,302, out of which, 5,722 are in East Jerusalem.
• Total number of housing units in approved plans – 15,156, approx. 8,950 of which have already been built.
• Total number of housing units in planning stages – 58,146.
• If all the plans are realized, the number of settlers in the Territories will be doubled (an addition of approx. 300,000 persons, based upon an average of 4 persons in each housing unit).
• In Gush Etzion (Bethlehem area) 17,000 housing units are planned in areas outside the existing settlements.
• At least six (6) outposts are included in the Ministry of Housing plans (Magen Dan, Givat Hadagan, Givat Hatamar, Bnei Adam, Bat Ayin West, Hill 26).
• There are plans for huge construction to double the size of some settlements, including: Beitar Illit, Ariel, Givat Ze’ev, Maaleh Adumim, Efrat and Geva Binyamin.
• Approx. 19,000 housing units are planned in settlements that are beyond the constructed path of the Fence (Kiryat Arba, Karnei Shomron, Ariel, Geva Binyamin, Immanuel, Revava).
• The plans in the settlements constitute 22% of the total housing units that are in planning stages in the Ministry of Housing.