RAMALLAH: The anti-settlement Israeli watchdog Peace Now on Wednesday said housing units are being built at a faster rate in West Bank Jewish settlements than in the rest of Israel.
Peace Now said in its new report, titled “Construction Freeze?” that despite Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s recently announced 10-month freeze on new housing starts in the West Bank, approved settlement construction is still higher than in the rest of Israel.
The left-wing movement added that during the period of the moratorium, 3,492 housing units were set to be built across the West Bank, which the report said averaged approximately 1,167 units for every 100,000 occupiers. Within the Green Line, 836 housing units will be built for the same number of Israelis, according to Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics figures quoted in the report.
Peace Now specifically noted that 476 housing units were set to be built in Maaleh Adumim settlement to the east of Jerusalem during the construction freeze, compared to cities of a similar size inside the Green Line, such as 59 in Dimona, and 12 in Or Yehuda. Similarly, 146 housing units were slated for construction in Ariel, to the east of Ramallah, compared to 32 in southern Israeli town of Sderot.
The report concluded that, “settlers’ claims of discrimination and attempts to ‘dry out’ the settlements have no basis in reality, even during the freeze a larger number of housing units than the national average will be built in the Occupied Territories.”
In terms of the moratorium itself, the report went on to list at least eight settlements where “fake foundations” had been constructed in an attempt to “obtain a building permit at the last moment.” In addition, at least ten other settlements had violated freeze orders, Peace Now said.
The movement vowed to “report all discoveries of violation of freeze orders directly to the Prime Minister's office and to the Ministry of Defense,” and to initiate legal proceedings against those who “take the law into their own hands” in the West Bank.
The report came as Netanyahu accused the Palestinian Authority on Wednesday of having chosen to postpone peace negotiations with Israel indefinitely as a “strategy.”
The Israeli Radio quoted Netanyahu as saying during cabinet meeting that “it appears that the Palestinians have adopted a strategy of delaying negotiations with Israel, and this is in order to refrain from meeting the demands of Israel and the international community, which require comprises on the Palestinian side.”
Netanyahu made the comments during a three-hour meeting held to discuss a freeze on new construction in West Bank settlements.
The Palestinians say the move is not genuine, since it does not include 3,000 homes already under construction in the West Bank or East Jerusalem, which they want as the capital of a future independent state.
“The Palestinian Authority is making a mistake they must understand: There will not be a real solution without direct negotiations with Israel, within whose framework we will reach accords and agreements,” Netanyahu added.
