From the Liveblog of
Thursday, March 12, 2026
Homesh settlement repopulated, over 20 years after Disengagement
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleJeremy Sharon is The Times of Israel’s legal affairs and settlements reporter
Ten families take up residence in the settlement of Homesh in the West Bank, in the final step of a lengthy process to legalize and repopulate the settlement that was evacuated in 2005 as part of the Gaza Disengagement.
The new residents formally resettle Homesh in a celebratory ceremony attended by Settlements and National Missions Minister Orit Strock, Likud MK Yuli Edelstein, chairman of the Samaria Regional Council Yossi Dagan, head of the Amana settlements organization Ze’ev Hever, and other pro-settlement dignitaries.
Homesh was evacuated with three other northern West Bank settlements — Sa Nur, Ganim and Kadim — in 2005 as part of the Ariel Sharon government’s plan to afford Palestinians territorial contiguity in the region.
The settlement movement long chafed at the dismantlement and evacuation of these settlements, and in 2023, the government, spearheaded by Edelstein, repealed the legislation that had enabled their evacuation.
In May 2025, the cabinet approved the legalization of Homesh, which has been rebuilt on a slightly different site, as well as Sa Nur, although the latter is yet to be repopulated.
“We chose Homesh as the arrowhead to lead the rectification for all the sins of the Disengagement, the sins of Oslo and the betrayal of the Land of Israel,” says Strock at the ceremony.
The current government has established or legalized 69 new settlements, and some 120 illegal settlement outposts have been built on its watch. The EU and other countries have strongly criticized the government’s deepening control of the West Bank and expansion of the settlements.
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