EU Calls Israeli Settlement Expansion Illegal
EU representative Katherine Ray on Saturday said that as settlements are illegal under international law, the EU and its Member States are "committed to ensure continued, full and effective implementation of existing EU legislation and bilateral arrangements applicable to settlements," Ma’an news agency reported.
The construction of 900 homes in the Jewish-only Ramat Shlomo settlement was approved by the Zionist regime’s District Planning and Building Committee earlier this week.
The plan was initially proposed in 2010. EU's Foreign Ministers unanimously called on Israel to reverse decisions for further settlement construction in occupied East Jerusalem in November 2014, but to no avail.
The approval for the Ramat Shlomo expansion came as Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu was in the final stages of piecing together a coalition government that will include the far-right Habayit Hayehudi (Jewish Home), which strongly backs settlement building and opposes a Palestinian state.
In the run up to his reelection in March, Netanyahu vowed to step up settlement construction in occupied East Jerusalem, which Israel occupied in 1967 and later annexed in a move never recognized by the international community.
