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       GENEVA: Israel has expanded and consolidated settlements in the occupied West Bank as part of the steady integration of these territories into the State of Israel, in breach of international law, the UN human rights office said on Tuesday.

       The report, based on research between Nov 1, 2023, and Oct 31, 2024, said there had been a “significant” expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and cited reports by Israeli non-governmental organisations of tens of thousands of planned housing units in new or existing settlements.

       The findings will be presented to the UN Human Rights Council this month and come amid growing fears of annexation among Palestinians, as US policy shifts under President Donald Trump and new settler outposts are put down in areas of the West Bank seen as part of a future Palestinian state.

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       Israel disengaged from the UN Human Rights Council earlier this year, alleging a chronic anti-Israeli bias. Around 700,000 Israeli settlers live among 2.7 million Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, land Israel captured in 1967. Most countries consider Israel’s settlements on territory seized in conflict to be illegal. Israel disputes this, citing historical and biblical ties to the land.

       Volker Turk urges Tel Aviv to evacuate all settlers from the occupied territory and make reparations for illegal settlement

       Israel’s opposition to ceding control of the West Bank has been deepened by its fears of a repeat of the Oct 7, 2023, raid by Hamas. Plans for the further provision of Israeli government services in these settlements “further institutionalise(s) long-standing patterns of systematic discrimination, segregation, oppression, domination, violence and other inhumane acts against the Palestinian people”, the report said.

       Evacuate all settlers

       Israel must evacuate all settlers from the West Bank and make reparations for decades of illegal settlement, the UN rights chief said, describing the policy as “a war crime”. “The transfer by Israel of parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies amounts to a war crime,” Volker Turk said in a statement, urging the international community to take meaningful action.

       “Israel must immediately and completely cease all settlement activities and evacuate all settlers, stop the forcible transfer of the Palestinian population, and prevent and punish attacks by its security forces and settlers.”

       The operation, dubbed “Iron Wall”, has resulted in several deaths, including Palestinian children and Israeli soldiers, according to the UN. Before that operation began, the UN rights office found that a total of 612 Palestinians were killed by Israeli security forces and settlers in the West Bank during the period covered by its report, amid “a climate of revenge”.

       During the same period, 24 Israelis were also killed in alleged attacks or clashes with Palestinians, it found.

       The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah has put the number of Palestinians killed in the West Bank between Oct 7, 2023 and March 14 at 911.

       Meanwhile, at least 32 Israelis, including soldiers, have been killed in that period in Palestinian attacks or during military operations, according to official Israeli figures.

       Tuesday’s report detailed “significant expansion of Israeli settlements” in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, during the first year of the conflict in neighbouring Gaza.

       Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2025