Jerusalem is to be extended further into the West Bank for the first time in nearly 60 years through a new settlement project, Israeli media reports said on Monday.
Hundreds of new housing units are to be built near a settlement in East Jerusalem that was taken over by Israel in 1967 and later annexed, Israeli news site ynet reported.
“This is the first time since 1967 that Jerusalem is being expanded into the West Bank,” Peace Now, the Israeli activist group pushing for a two-state solution, said in a statement.
“The government is carrying out de facto annexation through the back door,” the group said. There are two Palestinian communities in the area, it noted.
The Times of Israel and Peace Now reported that more than 2,700 housing units are planned, while Peace Now and ynet wrote that ultra-Orthodox Jews may be housed there. The project could be implemented within a few years.
Officially, the plan by Israeli authorities provides for building on land located in relative proximity to an Israeli settlement in the West Bank called Adam, according to the media reports and Peace Now.
The project is officially presented as an extension of this settlement, although there is no territorial connection between Adam and the proposed neighbourhood.
In practice the area would extend the Neve Yaakov settlement which, unlike Adam, is counted as part of East Jerusalem, as it lies beyond the Green Line, which runs between Israel proper and the territories captured by Israel in the Six-Day War.
Peace Now charges that, given the reality on the ground, saying the new “neighbourhood” simply extends the Adam one “is merely a pretext intended to conceal a move that effectively applies Israeli sovereignty to areas of the West Bank.”
