JERUSALEM/ISTANBUL

Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said Thursday that the Higher Planning Council will approve the construction of 1,973 new settlement units in the occupied West Bank during its next session.

He, however, did not specify when the council will meet, Israeli Channel 12 reported.

The announcement came just one day after Israel approved the building of 1,300 settler homes in the Gush Etzion settlement south of occupied East Jerusalem.

Smotrich said Israeli authorities have approved nearly 30,000 new settlement units in the West Bank this year, describing it as an “unprecedented achievement” for his government.

The Palestinian group Hamas, for its part, denounced the Israeli move as a “dangerous escalation in the policy of Judaization and settlement expansion targeting Palestinian land deep inside the West Bank.”

“These settlement plans constitute a blatant violation of international law and United Nations resolutions that criminalize settlement construction,” it added in a statement.

According to the daily Yedioth Ahronoth, since Benjamin Netanyahu’s government took office in late 2022, Israel has advanced plans for around 48,000 settlement units in the West Bank, averaging roughly 17,000 units per year.

On Aug. 20, the government granted final approval for the “E1” settlement plan, which includes the construction of about 3,400 housing units near the Ma’ale Adumim settlement.

The Israeli rights group Peace Now has described the E1 plan as a “fatal blow” to the two-state solution, as it would separate the northern and southern West Bank and isolate East Jerusalem.

The UN has repeatedly affirmed that Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories are illegal under international law, warning that they undermine prospects for a two-state solution.

Palestinians insist on East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state, based on international resolutions that do not recognize Israel’s 1967 occupation or its 1980 annexation of the city.