- The Defense Ministry has approved 600 new housing units
in Ma'aleh Adumim, the largest West Bank settlement, ministry spokesman
Eli Kamir said Monday.
-
- Political sources said the plan could breach an understanding
with the United States not to build more homes beyond the existing construction
line in West Bank settlements.
-
- The sources said clearance for the housing at Ma'aleh
Adumim, a few kilometers east of Jerusalem, was given two months ago by
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz.
-
- Mofaz said Monday that he wants Ma'aleh Adumim and the
large settlement bloc of Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem, to be included
within the West Bank separation fence, Army Radio reported.
-
- Speaking in Ma'aleh Adumim, Mofaz also said the amount
of Palestinian territory on the Israeli side of the fence will be reduced
by nearly half, from a planned 13,000 dunams to 7,000 dunams. The decision
comes in the wake of the recent High Court of Justice ruling that Israel
must take Palestinian needs into consideration in construction of the fence.
-
- Palestinian minister Saeb Erekat criticized the settlement
expansion. "This is in total defiance of the road map ... and total
defiance of [U.S. President George W.] Bush's vision. Settlements and peace
do not go together," he said.
-
- But Bush told Sharon at a meeting in April that Israel
could expect to be able to retain some West Bank land under any future
peace deal with Palestinians if it carries out a unilateral plan to withdraw
from Gaza next year.
-
- A security official said, "We will discuss this
new neighborhood with the Americans."
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- Ma'aleh Adumim, with almost 30,000 people, is one of
several large West Bank settlements Sharon wants to consolidate as part
of the disengagement plan, which entails evacuating the much smaller settler
population in Gaza as well as four isolated settlements in the West Bank.
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