Advancement of 2,545 Housing Units in the West Bank

The Higher Planning Council is set to discuss the approval of 2,545 housing units on Wednesday, April 2, 2025 in the settlements Maale Adumim and Beitar Illit.

Since November 2024, Just after the election of Trump as president of the USA, the Higher Planning Council started to hold weekly meetings to advance housing projects in the settlements. The shift to a weekly approval process not only normalizes construction in the Occupied Territories but also accelerates it. Since the beginning of 2025, including the plans slated for approval next week, the council will have advanced a total of 14,335 housing units in less than three months. 

Settlement Plans Overview

One of the changes made by the Netanyahu-Smotrich government in June 2023 was the elimination of the need for defense minister approval for each stage of settlement plan advancement. Previously, every construction plan in settlements required prior approval from the defense minister. In recent years, the defense minister had limited settlement plan advancements to approximately four times a year, with thousands of housing units being approved in a single session of the Higher Planning Council. In recent weeks, we have witnessed a change where the Higher Planning Council meets every week and approves several hundred housing units in each meeting. In this way, the government seeks to normalize planning in settlements and attract less public and international attention and criticism.

List of Plans Approved Since January 2025