Israel Defend New Settlement Expansion Plan
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended the finalizing of a plan to build nearly 800 apartments in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo.
“We place no limits on construction in our capital city,” Netanyahu said Sunday at the start of the weekly Cabinet meeting. “Just as they build in London, Paris, Washington and Moscow, we will continue to build in Jerusalem.”
Netanyahu’s response came after an exchange between the European Union policy chief Catherine Ashton and Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.
“Settlements are illegal under international law and threaten to make a two-state solution impossible,” said a statement issued over the weekend by Ashton’s office. “The EU has repeatedly urged the government of Israel to immediately end all settlement activities in the West Bank, including in east Jerusalem, in line with its obligations under the ‘road map.’ ”
Lieberman responded with a statement saying that Israel would not negotiate the status of Jerusalem.
“Jerusalem is not a settlement. Gilo is a Jewish neighborhood,” he said. “Today there are 32,000 to 33,000 Jews living there. It’s an integral part of Jerusalem.”
Israel’s Interior Ministry on Oct. 18 announced its final approval for plans to build 797 new apartments in Gilo, located in the southern part of eastern Jerusalem. The initial approval for the project came in June.
The Jerusalem Municipality must still issue building permits for the project.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward He called a Nazi sympathizer ‘extraordinary.’ Now he’s a nominee for U.S. attorney.
-
Opinion This is my last column as editor of the Forward
-
Books Unwieldy, unnerving, and a masterpiece — the last great Yiddish novel has arrived
-
Fast Forward Texas bakery reportedly becomes first bagel shop to be named James Beard Award finalist
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.