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Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Israel annexes land near West Bank settlement of Ma'ale Adumim — newspaper

According to the official data, a total of 3,426 new housing units in the settlements will be submitted for its approval

TEL AVIV, February 29. /TASS/. Israel has annexed several tracts of land with a total area of 264 hectares near the large Jewish settlement of Ma'ale Adumim in the West Bank, The Jerusalem Post reported.

According to the newspaper, the land is considered part of the Ma'ale Adumim settlement, located east of Jerusalem, but there are no plans yet to develop it.

Peace Now, a human rights organization that monitors Israeli settlement activity, said a meeting of the West Bank Settlement Planning Committee is scheduled for March 6. A total of 3,426 new housing units in the settlements, which are in various stages of approval, will be submitted for its approval. According to human rights activists, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said a week ago that Israeli authorities would approve the construction of at least 3,350 housing units in the West Bank settlements of Ma'ale Adumim, Efrat and Kedar, following the February 22 attack by armed radicals on the highway near Jerusalem that killed one Israeli citizen and injured 11 others.

Israel's continued settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem is considered a major obstacle to resolving the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli stalemate. In December 2016, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 2334, demanding that Israel immediately cease settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory. Israel declared on the same day that it would not comply with the provisions of the document.

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Israeli-Palestinian conflict

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