Israel granted legal status on Sunday to a previously unauthorized outpost in the occupied West Bank in response to a Palestinian shooting attack last month that killed one of its residents. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the decision to retroactively authorize the 50-family outpost of Havat Gilad was meant to “allow the continuation of normal life there.”Most countries deem Israeli settlements in the West Bank, land Israel captured in a 1967 war that the Palestinians want for a future state, to be illegal. Israel disputes this. All settlements in the West Bank, including in Jerusalem, are illegal,” said Wasel Abu Youssef, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s executive committee. On January 9, Havat Gilad resident Rabbi Raziel Shevah was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home.

Source: Egypt Independent February 04, 2018 13:41 UTC