Israel has begun construction of the first new settlement in the occupied West Bank in 25 years, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calling it an “honour” to build the illegal outpost in defiance of international law. “After decades, I have the honour to be the first prime minister to build a settlement in Judea and Samaria,” Netanyahu said on Tuesday, calling the occupied West Bank by its biblical name. “There was not, and there will never be, as good a government for the settlements as ours,” the prime minister added. Before the “Oslo Accords” officially opened negotiations in 1993, between Palestine and Israel, roughly 200,000 settlers illegally lived in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The new settlement, the first since 1992, according to Israeli NGO Peace Now, is intended to house residents of the illegal West Bank outpost of Amona after the Israeli military demolished it in February.

Source: Dhaka Tribune June 20, 2017 11:37 UTC