Establishing settlements in occupied territory is unlawful and constitutes a blatant violation of international law. This prohibition stems, in part, from the occupying power’s duty to act as a trustee for the benefit of the protected population, and from Article 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the transfer of the occupying power’s population into occupied territory. Beyond its illegality, settlement is a key annexation practice. It establishes permanent civilian presence of the occupying power in a territory meant to be held temporarily. By taking over land and building infrastructure for the occupier’s citizens, it effectively changes the character and status of the occupied territory.

Every Israeli government has supported the West Bank settlement enterprise to some degree. All have helped it grow and expand, pursuing a policy that clearly violates international law. The 37th government stands out, however, for the dramatic and unprecedented steps taken to consolidate and establish settlements and to remove political and planning barriers that had helped put some limits on the expansion of Israeli control in the West Bank. To this end, it has taken planning mechanisms out of the military’s hands, removed obstacles to advancing construction plans, and decided to establish dozens of new settlements and retroactively approve existing outposts.

In February 2023, responsibility for planning and construction within the Civil Administration was transferred to the Additional Minister in the Ministry of Defense, Bezalel Smotrich. In June that year, the government also gave Smotrich the authority to approve settlement construction plans, previously held by the Minister of Defense. By repealing Government Resolution 150, it eliminated the requirement for further government-level approval at later stages, fundamentally changing planning and construction procedures in the West Bank. Until then, unlike inside Israel and given the far-reaching political implications of establishing settlements, the government could halt the planning process at any stage, though the process in its entirety advanced unlawful construction under international law.

Removing these restrictions and bringing the West Bank’s planning and construction system in line with Israel’s are intended to facilitate the expansion of the Israeli settlement enterprise. Even ignoring the accelerated pace of construction, this is itself a step toward annexation of the West Bank as it gradually replaces military governing mechanisms with civilian ones, blurs the distinction between occupied territory and sovereign Israel, and makes it possible for Israel to treat the West Bank as its own.

Since November 2024, the Supreme Planning Council has met weekly, a break from its past practice of meeting only a handful of times a year. As a result, settlement construction and development plans are being approved at a significantly faster pace, laying the planning groundwork for extensive Israeli construction that is completely reshaping the West Bank. All of this is pursued away from public view and scrutiny.

According to Peace Now monitoring, plans for a total of 58,481 housing units in settlements were advanced between 2023 and 2026, laying the groundwork for the absorption of approximately 200,000 additional settlers. Meanwhile, Israel’s planning institutions reject almost all Palestinian building permit applications in Area C. For example, according to data the Civil Administration provided to Bimkom, in 2024, for example, 1,165 building permits were issued for construction in settlements, compared with just three permits for Palestinians out of 1,111 applications.

E1

One of the most significant planning measures was the final approval, in August 2025, of plans for 3,401 housing units in E1. Construction in this area is intended to create a contiguous Israeli built-up area between Ma’ale Adumim and Jerusalem, cut East Jerusalem off from its Palestinian surroundings, sever the northern West Bank from the south and effectively eliminate the possibility of a future Palestinian state. Implementation also threatens Palestinian communities living in the area, particularly shepherding communities that have faced the threat of expulsion for years.

New Settlements

Through a series of government and Security Cabinet decisions since February 2023, Israel’s 37th government has approved the establishment, retroactive approval or independent recognition of 104 settlements. This is an unprecedented number of retroactive approvals and declarations: 50 unauthorized outposts are slated for retroactive approval, 16 settlements previously considered neighborhoods of official settlements have been granted independent status, and 38 entirely new settlements are to be built. By comparison, in the decade before this government took office, Israeli governments approved three settlements.

Settlement Revival in the Northern West Bank

In March 2023, the Knesset repealed the Disengagement Law provisions that prohibited Israelis from accessing parts of the northern West Bank where settlements were removed in 2005, paving the way to reestablish four of these settlements. For approximately two decades, this area, covering more than 500,000 dunams, was almost completely free of settler presence, and while the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living there remained under a regime of military repression, the relative absence of settlers enabled them to maintain a more active industry, commerce, agriculture, education and culture than in other areas.

Five months after the provisions were repealed, Yossi Dagan, head of the Samaria Regional Council, presented the One Million in Samaria plan. It seeks to increase the settler population in the northern West Bank by establishing settlements and cities, industrial zones, a railway and an airport. The plan does not mention the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in the area, and the map attached to it omits the Green Line. The plan includes reestablishing the four settlements removed from northern Samaria and 14 additional ones. The Security Cabinet has already approved all 18 settlements, and they are at various stages of planning and construction. Another settlement in the area, Sa-Nur East, was approved in July 2026. Implementation is already underway, and occupancy has begun in Homesh, Gannim, Kadim, Sa-Nur, Emek Dotan and Noa.

By advancing tens of thousands of housing units and establishing, expanding or retroactively approving dozens of settlements, the state is laying the groundwork for settlement population growth and entrenching Israeli control over the occupied territory in violation of international law. These measures lead to takeovers of Palestinian land. They break territorial contiguity between Palestinian communities, including in Areas A and B, and push communities off their land. In this way, Israel is reshaping the territorial configuration and demographic composition of the occupied territory, entrenches its control and effectively annexes it.