Number of illegal Jewish settlers in the West Bank increased by 37% since the "Road Map"

[ 10/07/2009 - 02:04 PM ]

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)--

An Israeli human rights group said that the number of the illegal Israeli Jewish settlers in the West Bank, excluding east Jerusalem, has reached 289,600 increasing by 37% since the Israeli government agreed to the "Road Map" which calls for a freeze on all forms of settlement activity.

The report published on Thursday by B'Tselem said that the increase in settler population in the West Bank (excluding east Jerusalem) over the past six years has reached 37%, and that while the population growth in Israel last year has reached 1.8% the growth in the settlement population has reached 5.6% over the same period.

The report pointed out that the Israeli government uses the excuse of natural growth and other weak excuses, such as unification of settlers' families to justify the expansion of settlements.

The report also said that the Israeli government makes all sorts of excuses to evade a freeze on settlement activity despite having constitutional powers to freeze settlement activity giving the excuse that the Israeli law prohibits imposing a freeze on settlement activity.

The report also pointed out that while Jewish settlements occupy 1.7% of the area of the West Bank, they are structured to occupy 6.8% of the West Bank which indicates that there are plans to expand the settlements.

B'Tselem expected the rate of settlement to increase especially with Eili Yisahi, the Israeli interior minister, promising to do all that is possible to accelerate settlement during his term in office.

Fair Use Notice

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.