June 18 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Israeli Council of Ministers has approved this Sunday a regulatory amendment that simplifies the procedures and reduces the deadlines for the approval of the construction of new Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
With these changes, it will be the Finance Minister, Minister within the Defense portfolio and leader of the ultra-right Religious Zionism party, Bezalel Smotrich, who will now control the two phases necessary for the approval of new constructions.
The construction of new houses in the West Bank settlements is expected to be approved next week, which has already sparked protests from the Palestinian Authority.
Precisely after the news of the regulatory change was released, the new Secretary General of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Minister of Civil Affairs of the Palestinian Authority, Hussein al Sheikh, has announced that they will not attend the meeting with the Israeli Government of the Joint Economic Commission scheduled for this Monday.
The Palestinian leaders “will study other measures and decisions to apply in reference to the relationship with Israel,” Al Sheikh explained in a message posted on Twitter. The Joint Economic Commission has not met since 2009.
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also criticized the “seriousness” of the legal change that gives all power to Smotrich and has denounced that it is one more step to facilitate the “silent” approval of new settlements.
For this reason, he has asked the United States to pressure Israel to reverse the initiative and “force the Israeli government to stop its unilateral illegal actions” because they harm the options of achieving a two-state solution.
The West Bank –including East Jerusalem– and the Gaza Strip –from which Israel withdrew in 2005– were militarily occupied by Israel in the 1967 war along with the Golan Heights –in dispute with Syria–.
In total, some 700,000 Jewish settlers live in the West Bank, some of them in colonies considered legal by Israel and some in settlements considered illegal even by the Israeli government. International Law considers the colonization of militarily occupied territories a war crime.
