Jewish settler population in the West Bank surpasses half a million
The number of Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank now exceeds half a million, a pro-settler group said Thursday, with leaders predicting faster population growth under Israel’s new ultranationalist government.
A report by WestBankJewishPopulationStats.com showed that, based on official figures, the settler population grew to 502,991 as of Jan. 1, rising more than 2.5% in 12 months and nearly 16% over the last five years.
“We’ve reached a huge hallmark,” said Baruch Gordon, the director of the group and a resident of the Beit El settlement. “We’re here to stay.”
Israel’s new government, made up of ultranationalist parties that oppose Palestinian statehood, has made Jewish settlement expansion its top priority. Officials have pledged to legalize wildcat outposts that have enjoyed tacit government support and to ramp up approval and construction of settler homes around the West Bank.
“I think that in the coming years of this government there will be more building than there has been in the last 20 years of governments,” Gordon said.
Settlements have flourished under every Israeli government, including at the height of the peace process in the 1990s. Even Israel’s previous government, which included parties supporting Palestinian statehood along with those opposing it, continued to build settlements.
Residents and activists say the Israeli military has demolished homes, water tanks and olive orchards in two Palestinian villages in the occupied West Bank.
The report comes as a new spasm of violence is shaking the region and days after a visit by U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, who pledged support for an independent Palestinian state. The settler population has continued to grow under the Biden administration, despite renewed American appeals to rein in construction following the end of the Trump administration’s hands-off approach.
The settler population report does not include annexed East Jerusalem, which is home to more than 200,000 settlers. The West Bank and East Jerusalem are home to some 3 million Palestinians.
Israel captured the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians seek those territories for an independent state.
Although Israel withdrew troops and several thousand settlers from Gaza in 2005, it has charged ahead with settlement building in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Dozens of settlements dot the territory, some as small as a few mobile homes and others sprawling cities, with malls and public transportation.
An Israeli group raising funds for Jewish extremists convicted of hate crimes against Palestinians is collecting tax-exempt donations from Americans.
Much of the international community views the settlements as illegal and an obstacle to peace. The Palestinians see them as a land grab that undermines their chances to establish a viable, contiguous state.
“All settlements are illegal. There is no legitimacy for settlements or the presence of settlers in the Palestinian territories,” said Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a spokesman for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. “The increase in the number of settlers is the result of Israeli government policies that do not believe in the two-state solution,” which would create an independent Palestinian state next to Israel.
Israel claims that the West Bank is disputed rather than occupied territory, saying that terminology denies the Jewish people’s historical presence in the land. It argues that the fate of settlements should be part of negotiations to bring about an end to the conflict.
Peace efforts have been moribund for nearly 15 years, during which time Israel continued to establish facts on the ground with more settlement construction and political rivalry among the Palestinians complicated peacemaking.
The recent violence in Israel is a reminder that the war with the Palestinians can’t just be stashed indefinitely on the back burner.
The settlers and their many supporters in government view the West Bank as the biblical and historical heartland of the Jewish people and are opposed to any partition.
Palestinians and Israelis in the West Bank live under a two-tiered legal system that grants settlers special status and applies much of Israeli law to them, including the right to vote in Israeli elections and the ability to access certain public services. Palestinians live under Israeli military rule and do not enjoy the legal rights and protections afforded to settlers.
The open-ended military occupation has led three well-known human rights groups to conclude that Israel is committing the international crime of apartheid by systematically denying Palestinians equal rights. Israel rejects those accusations as an attack on its existence as a Jewish-majority state and points to the achievements of its citizens of Palestinian origin to counter the argument.
The increasingly authoritarian and unpopular Palestinian Authority, established through agreements with Israel in the 1990s, administers parts of the West Bank, while the Islamic militant group Hamas controls Gaza, which is under an Israeli-Egyptian blockade.
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