Published: 11 February 2017
Last updated: 4 March 2024
‘The settlements grow apace, peace remains stalled and Israel’s intentions seem a genuine mystery in Western capitals. Yet the question has a surprisingly simple answer, one which hasn’t changed since 1948.’
And see:
Number of Israeli settlers living in West Bank tops 421,000: NGO – i24news 09.02.17
Yesha Council says the number of settlers in the territory has grown by 3.9% since 2015.
A deal with Trump re ‘settlement blocs’? November 19, 2016
‘Settlement bloc’ is an informal term. Israel has never formally defined the blocs. Neither the Palestinians nor the international community recognise settlements in blocs as having any special status, compared to other settlements. And construction in the blocs was barred under Phase I of the Road Map. In any future negotiation over settlements and territory, the hardest issue to resolve is not going to be the fate of small and isolated settlements but the fate of the ‘settlement blocs’, which and how much of them Israel will want to keep and how connection to Israel can be achieved without destroying contiguity and viability of a Palestinian state.
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