Israeli government legalizes settlement outpost in occupied West Bank

ISTANBUL

The Israeli government agreed on Wednesday to legalize a settlement outpost near Hebron city in the occupied West Bank.

According to Israeli Channel 14, the Adorayim outpost will be officially recognized by the end of the year, eight years after it was built.

The government decided to consider the outpost, where 26 illegal settler families live, as a recognized settlement, the broadcaster said.

The Hebron Mountain Regional Council, an Israeli settlement body in the southern West Bank, was informed about the Israeli decision.

Last June, the Israeli government approved steps proposed by far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich aimed at "legalizing" settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank, including the Adorayim settlement.

The settlement is built on lands for Palestinians from Dura town; expropriated first by the Israeli army in the 1970s to build a military base. The army dismantled the base in 2010, where illegal settlers later seized the area and built an outpost.

The international community, including the UN, considers the Israeli settlements illegal under international law. The UN has repeatedly warned that continued settlement expansion threatens the viability of a two-state solution, a framework seen as key to resolving the decades-long Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

In July 2024, the International Court of Justice declared Israel's decades-long occupation of Palestinian land illegal and demanded the evacuation of all existing settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.