(Jerusalem) Israel has approved the seizure of 1,270 hectares of land in the occupied West Bank, the largest land grab in Palestinian territory in three decades, according to the Israeli organization Peace Now on Wednesday.
The land, located in the Jordan Valley, was declared “government property” by the Israeli authority responsible for land affairs in the Palestinian Territories at the end of June, according to official documents consulted by AFP.
This is a record seizure since the Oslo Peace Accords (1993), the anti-colonization organization said in a statement. “The size of the area […] is the largest since the Oslo Accords, and the year 2024 marks a peak in the extent of state land declarations.”
The Israeli decision “is a step in the wrong direction,” said Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN secretary-general. “The direction we want to go is to find a negotiated two-state solution” between Israel and the Palestinians.
Since the beginning of the year, the Israeli government has officially seized 23.7 km2 from the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967. On March 22, he announced the seizure of 800 hectares of land in the West Bank with a view to building new colonies there.
The decision was described as a “provocation” by Peace Now, which said Palestinians were losing their right to own or use land declared “state land.”
Authorities have not publicly commented on the latest seizure.
This comes as violence and tensions between Palestinians and Israelis in the West Bank have increased due to the Gaza war between the Israeli army and the Palestinian Hamas.
” [Benjamin] Netanyahu and [Bezalel] Smotrich 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,” Peace Now added, referring to the Israeli prime minister and his finance minister.
“Today, it is clear to everyone that this conflict cannot be resolved without a political settlement establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel,” the organization continues, “and yet the government chooses to make this difficult.”
Israeli colonization in the West Bank (including annexed East Jerusalem) is illegal under international law, the UN regularly points out, for which this colonization is one of the main obstacles to the resolution of the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Dozens of illegal settlements have been established in the West Bank in addition to those authorized by the Israeli authorities.
Some 490,000 Israelis live in settlements in the West Bank, among some three million Palestinians.
After the announcement of the seizure of 800 hectares in March, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the expansion of settlements “counterproductive to achieving lasting peace” with the Palestinians.
Several international organizations, including the UN Office for Humanitarian Affairs, denounce, in addition to colonization, the harassment of Palestinians by settlers, which pushes these Palestinians to leave their lands.