Israel claims land in West Bank

Israeli women walk in a Jewish settlement known as "Gevaot", in the Etzion settlement bloc, near Bethlehem. Photo: Reuters

Jerusalem: Israel laid claim on Sunday to nearly 400 hectares (1000 acres) of West Bank land in a Jewish settlement bloc near Bethlehem - a step that could herald significant Israeli construction in the area - defying Palestinian demands for a halt in settlement expansion and challenging world opinion.

Peace Now, an Israeli group that opposes the construction of settlements in the West Bank, said that the action on Sunday might be the largest single appropriation of West Bank land in decades and that it could "dramatically change the reality" in the area.

Palestinians aspire to form a state in the lands that Israel conquered in 1967.

Israeli officials said the political directive to expedite a survey of the status of the land came after three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped and killed in June while hitchhiking in that area. In July, the Israeli authorities arrested a Palestinian who was accused of being the prime mover in the kidnapping and killing of the teenagers. The timing of the land appropriation suggested that it was meant as a kind of compensation for the settlers and punishment for the Palestinians.

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The land, which is near the Jewish settlement of Gvaot in the Etzion bloc south of Jerusalem, has now officially been declared "state land," as opposed to land privately owned by Palestinians, clearing the way for the potential approval of Israeli building plans there.

But the mayor of the nearby Palestinian town of Surif, Ahmad Lafi, said the land belonged to Palestinian families. He told the official Palestinian news agency WAFA that Israeli army forces and personnel posted orders early on Sunday announcing the seizure of land that was planted with olive and forest trees in Surif and the nearby villages of Al-Jaba'a and Wadi Fukin.

Interested parties have 45 days in which to register objections.

The kidnapping of the teenagers prompted an Israeli military clampdown in the West Bank against Hamas, the Islamic group that dominates Gaza and that Israel said was behind the abductions. The subsequent tensions along the Israel-Gaza border erupted into a 50-day war that ended last week with an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire.

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Israel claims land in West Bank