LONDON: Israeli authorities began on Wednesday excavation and bulldozing work to build a new settlement near the city of Hebron, south of the occupied West Bank.
In January, authorities announced a plan to build a settlement on Palestinian-owned lands in the Mount Tarousa area, located west of Dura town in the Hebron governorate.
Settlers accompanied the forces that brought trucks, several caravans and water tanks as digging and bulldozing work began, according to the Palestine News Agency.
Far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich visited Mount Tarousa on Tuesday to lay the foundation stone for the new settlement. Settlers pitched a tent and displayed a large sign announcing the establishment of “Doren” before that.
Israel seized the mount in the 1980s, preventing Palestinians in the area from building on it. The project aims to connect two settlements, Adora and Negohot, and will isolate about 50,000 people from easy access to the western part of Hebron.
“Doren” is one of 19 settlements approved by the Israeli government in 2025.
Smotrich has called for the annexation of the West Bank and presented plans to expand settlements to block any future Palestinian state since he took office in 2022 in the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyaghu.
All settlements in the West Bank are considered illegal under international law. Excluding East Jerusalem, which was occupied and annexed by Israel in 1967, about 500,000 Israeli settlers live in the West Bank, alongside about three million Palestinians.
