According to an anti-settlement monitoring group, the Israeli government has set aside huge sums of money for protecting tiny unlawful Jewish farms in the occupied West Bank with a view to turning them into settlements. Peace Now has discovered documents that show Israel’s pro-settler government has been quietly channeling funds into these unauthorized outposts, which are separate from its more than 100 officially recognized settlements. Some of those outposts have been linked to settler violence against Palestinians and are sanctioned by the US.
All settlements, Palestinians as well as the international community argue, are illegal or illegitimate and undermine hopes for a two-state solution.
The Ministry of Settlements and National Mission (MSNM), lead by a far-right settler leader, acknowledged that it had set aside 75 million shekels ($20.5 million) last year for security equipment for “young settlements”, as they call these unofficial Jewish farms and outposts on the West Bank. The country’s attention was focused on the war on Hamas in Gaza when the money was quietly authorized in December.
These funds have seen Peace Now purchase vehicles; drones; cameras; generators; electric gates; fences and new roads that go up some of their remotest farms.
It also estimated there were around 500 people living at the smaller unauthorized farmsteads with another 25,000 or so at larger outposts which often receive tacit support before being retroactively legalized by the authorities.
Hagit Ofran, director of Peace Now’s “settlement watch” program said this was first time that funding had been channeled so openly to these outposts by Israel’s government. Rights groups maintain that such remote hilltop farm networks across the West Bank are primarily responsible for Palestinian displacement and violence.
Israel’s government has just made five previous unauthorized settlements legal in one month alone while also declaring its largest land grab since three decades ago in anticipation of constructing new buildings throughout the West Bank.
Since the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, Palestinians say violence by people associated with these farms has soared; Israeli subsequently waged war against the militant group in Gaza.
On Friday, the top United Nations court said that Israeli presence in Palestine territories are illegal and ordered for an immediate halt of settlement construction. In response to this nonbinding opinion, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed such a view pointing out that those territories were part of his country’s historical land.
The Palestinians claim all three territories in addition to Gaza for a future nation. In 1967, Israel grabbed them during Middle East conflict: it has settled over half a million Jews in Western Bank where most of them live in authorized settlements but there are also more than two hundred thousand other settlers in East Jerusalem which is disputed as its capital.
Netanyahu’s right-wing administration is driven mainly by West Bank settlers and pro-settler politicians. For this reason, Netanyahu placed his finance minister Bezalel Smotrich within defense ministry taking charge of settlement construction and development as his new position.
International sanctions have been levied on 13 extreme Israeli settlers, some of whom are involved in the outpost farms – as well as two linked outposts and four groups – by the United States, Britain, and the European Union for allegations of aggression and intimidation on Palestinians. These measures act as a deterrent exposing individuals to asset freeze, travel bans, and visa bans but freezing has been less effective.
Strock’s office also said that these funds were “coordinated” with the Defense Ministry and “carried out in accordance with all laws.” It further added that Strock herself is “aware of the great importance of strengthening settlements” despite international criticism.
The budget was approved in December prior to any sanctions. The government did not release a list of farmsteads or outposts that received funding so it is unclear whether sanctioned farms would be among them. However, since Peace Now identified 68 out of about 70 farms, funded through this budget Ofran guessed that at least some must be part; meanwhile this number has grown to over 90.
According to Peace Now, who discovered the financial decision from recordings and presentations made at a conference held last month by the right-wing religious Zionist party at an outpost called Shaharit Farm in northern West Bank. Among those present were Strock and Smotrich.
Settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank has been repeatedly denounced by US officials like President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Similar concerns have also been raised recently by Israel’s retired top general in West Bank.
Israel says it is combating such attacks while considering imposition unnecessary economic penalties.
