ISTANBUL

Israel’s Security Cabinet approved a plan to separate and legalize 13 settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday.

“We continue to lead a revolution of normalization and regulation in the settlements. Instead of hiding and apologizing – we raise the flag, build and settle. This is another important step on the path to actual sovereignty in Judea and Samaria (West Bank),” Smotrich said.

The decision to separate the settlement outposts came during a Cabinet meeting held Saturday night.

The Palestinian resistance group Hamas condemned the Israeli move as a “desperate attempt to impose a fait accompli.”

Smotrich's comments “confirm that settlements, in all their forms, are a racist colonization project aimed at displacing our people, stealing their land and holy sites, and imposing a hateful apartheid regime, in flagrant violation of all international and humanitarian laws and conventions," it said in a statement.

Hamas called on the international community to take action to stop Israel’s illegal settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank.

Palestinian reports estimate that by the end of 2024, approximately 770,000 illegal Israeli settlers were living in 180 settlements and 256 outposts across the occupied territory.

The United Nations considers all Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories illegal under international law and warns that continued expansion threatens efforts for a two-state solution.

Tension has been running high across the occupied West Bank, where at least 937 Palestinians have been killed and over 7,000 injured in attacks by the Israeli army and illegal settlers since the start of the Gaza onslaught on Oct. 7, 2023, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

In July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s longstanding occupation of Palestinian territories illegal, calling for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.