Peace Now, an anti-settlement group, says that Israel has advanced plans for the construction of more than 4,000 homes in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, a day after the Israeli army demolished homes in an area where hundreds of Palestinians face the threat of expulsion. Al Jazeera reports that there was no immediate Israeli government statement, but responding on Twitter to Peace Now’s tally, Israel’s Interior Minister called it “a festive day for the settlement of Judea and Samaria” – the names Israel uses for the occupied West Bank.
