The office of the Palestinian Presidency condemned the plan as a “gross violation of international law.”
Published on 10 April 2026
The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has condemned the approval of 34 new settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, saying the decision violates international law.
Israeli rights group Peace Now reported late Thursday that the government had taken the decision “secretly” in early April. The decision was also widely reported by Israeli media outlets.
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The office of the Palestinian Presidency condemned the plan as a “gross violation of international law.” There was no immediate comment from the Israeli government.
Israel is an “occupying power”, it has no sovereignty over the occupied Palestinian territory, including East al-Quds (Jerusalem), and all of its measures aimed at changing the geographical and demographic reality there are null and void under international law, the OIC Secretary-General said in a statement on Friday.
The 34 settlements approved Thursday are on top of the 68 settlements approved by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government since coming to power in 2022.
The OIC General Secretariat also warned about the seriousness of “the escalation of settlements policies, land seizures, settler terrorism and efforts to impose so-called Israeli sovereignty on the occupied West Bank, stressing that it aims to undermine the two-state solution and violate the rights of the Palestinian people”.
Turkiye also criticized Israel’s approval of new settlements, calling it a “serious violation of international law and UN resolutions”.
Israel’s Channel 24 reported that the Security Cabinet “secretly” approved the establishment of these new settlements during a recent session.
“This is the largest ever number of settlements approved in a single cabinet session,” it said.
News website Ynet reported that military chief Eyal Zamir warned during a security cabinet meeting on 1 April that the army could “collapse” due to increasing demands on manpower. This included legalizing dozens of outposts, granting them official settlement status and thus providing protection from Israeli troops.
The approved sites include locations in Palestinian neighborhoods in the northern West Bank and remote areas where Israeli forces rarely reach, Channel 24 said, adding that 10 of the 34 settlements are already existing outposts, which are illegal under Israeli law but will now be retroactively legalized under the decision.
The remaining 24 are still under construction. All Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are illegal under international law.
This decision has not been officially published by any Israeli government body.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. Excluding East Jerusalem, more than 500,000 Israelis, out of approximately three million Palestinians, now live in settlements there.
Settlement expansion has been a major policy under successive Israeli governments since 1967, but has significantly accelerated under the Netanyahu-led coalition.
Rights groups say approval of new settlements, land seizures and settler violence have escalated since Israel began its genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023, killing more than 72,000 Palestinians.
