Over 2,100 settlement housing units advance in planning process

The construction of 2,162 housing units in three West Bank settlements is approved by the Higher Planning Council of the Civil Administration, a department of the Defense Ministry.

The committee approves 1,006 units for Gvaot in the Gush Etzion region of the West Bank in one of the most important stages of the planning process, which will massively expand the settlement — where several dozen families currently live — and create homes for thousands of new residents.

Gvaot was established in 1997 as a neighborhood of existing settlement Alon Shvut, even though it lies some 3 kilometers (2 miles) northwest of Alon Shvut, in order to bypass the need for cabinet authorization of a new settlement.

The government formally authorized Gvaot as a new settlement in March 2025.

The Higher Planning Committee also approves 922 units for the settlement of Har Bracha in the Samaria region in an early stage of the planning process, which will triple the size of the settlement, currently home to 3,500 residents.

Another 234 units are approved for Kiryat Arba in the southern West Bank, adjacent to Hebron, in the last stage of the planning process.

“This is not just a planning step, but a national development that solidifies our hold on the territory, strengthens Israel’s security, and establishes clear facts that prevent the establishment of an Arab terrorist state in the heart of the country,” says far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

Smotrich has been the architect of the government’s unprecedented expansion of the settlement movement, including approval of new settlements for the first time in decades; the retroactive legalization of formerly illegal settlement outposts; and a massive increase in approval for housing construction in the various planning stages.