Israel has authorized the largest land grab in the occupied West Bank in more than three decades, according to a study issued by an Israeli anti-settlement group, in a move apparently poised to exacerbate the increasing tensions surrounding the Gaza crisis.
According to Peace Now, last month Israeli officials gave the green light to the taking of 12.7 sq km (almost 5 sq miles) of land in the Jordan valley; this is “the largest single appropriation approved since the 1993 Oslo accords,” which marked the beginning of the peace process.
The current property purchase, according to settlement monitors, connects Israeli settlements along a vital corridor that is next to Jordan, possibly jeopardizing the possibility of a future Palestinian state. Declaring them public property means the government forbids Palestinians from owning them privately and allows Israelis to lease them.
Israel’s relentless West Bank growth is seen as a reflection of the settler community’s stronghold on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration, which is the most nationalist and religious in the Jewish state’s history. As a settler himself, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has accelerated the program, assuming increased control over settlement growth and declaring his intention to maintain Israel’s sovereignty over the region and thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Smotrich and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to Peace Now, “are determined to fight against the entire world and against the interests of the people of Israel for the benefit of a handful of settlers.”
Smotrich, who previously said that his “life’s mission is to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state,” gave the Israeli government departments instructions in May 2023 to be ready for the 500,000 more Israeli settlers who would be moving into the occupied West Bank.
During a convention for his National Religious Party-Religious Zionism, Smotrich said in a leaked video obtained by Peace Now that the average number of confiscations of land in 2024 had surpassed it by almost 10 times. “This thing is mega-strategic and we are investing a lot in it,” he reportedly said. “This is something that will change the map dramatically.”
U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric described Israel’s latest move as “a step in the wrong direction,” adding that “the direction we want to be heading is to find a negotiated two-state solution.”
The West Bank, Gaza Strip, and east Jerusalem – areas that the Palestinians desire for their future state – were all taken over by Israel during the 1967 Middle East War. In the West Bank, the Jewish state has constructed well over a hundred communities, some of which resemble fully fledged small towns or suburbs. Over 500,000 Jewish settlers who hold Israeli citizenship reside there.
