Smotrich Drives 90-Family West Bank Settlement Growth as Violence and Outposts Surge
Updated
Updated · The New York Times · Oct 27
Smotrich Drives 90-Family West Bank Settlement Growth as Violence and Outposts Surge
3 articles · Updated · The New York Times · Oct 27
Summary
Pnei Kedem has grown to 90 families from 16 in 18 years, illustrating the settlement expansion tied to Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s hard-right Religious Zionist camp.
Wildcat outposts are spreading rapidly across the West Bank, and the article says soaring settler violence against Palestinians is reinforcing Israel’s push for permanent control of the territory.
About 3 million Palestinians live in the West Bank, where most of the world regards Israel’s 59-year occupation and the settlements built there as illegal under international law.
Smotrich’s rise has made settlement growth a central political project, sharpening the divide between Israelis who see the land as a biblical and lawful inheritance and those who view the expansion as entrenching occupation.