Thirty Israeli families have returned to the Kadim settlement in the occupied West Bank, two decades after it was evacuated under Israel’s 2005 Disengagement Plan.
The families arrived on Thursday, according to the regional settlers’ council, travelling in small groups from Tel Aviv. Some were escorted by the military, while vehicles carrying Israeli flags and trailers loaded with furniture, bedding and construction materials passed through nearby Palestinian villages and farmland.
Israel’s current government has lifted a 20-year prohibition on Jewish settlement around Jenin. Kadim, on a hillside outside the Palestinian city, is the last of four northern West Bank settlements evacuated in 2005 to reopen. Ganim, Sanur and Homesh have already been formally reopened and have residents, according to the report.
At a ceremony marking the return, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said Kadim’s reopening corrected what he described as the earlier expulsion from northern Samaria, the Biblical term he used for the northern West Bank. The event was also attended by Justice Minister and Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana, as well as Yossi Dagan, head of the regional settlers’ council.
All Israeli settlements and settler outposts in the West Bank are considered illegal under international law. Outposts are also illegal under Israeli law, although the source said they often receive state services and funding.
Palestinian concerns over rapid expansion
Palestinian residents near Kadim said the return of settlers had increased their fears. A vegetable farmer living near the site said his family had watched the settlement first being built, then evacuated in 2005. He said that while residents had previously coexisted peacefully, he was now concerned by developments around the settlement and by restrictions affecting his relatives’ access to agricultural land.
Near the newly opened Emek Dotan settlement west of Jenin, teacher Samer Jaber said groups had filmed his family outside their home, attempted to enter houses and shone powerful lights through windows at night. He said he was placing concrete blocks around part of his home because he feared for his children.
Since taking office in late 2022, Israel’s government has approved more than 100 new settlements across the West Bank, including 19 in its northern part, according to Peace Now’s Settlement Watch director Hagit Ofran. She said the construction around Jenin was part of a broader push to expand settlements before Israeli elections scheduled for October.
The report also described construction of two military bases near Jenin and a military outpost on seized Palestinian land beside Jenin Refugee Camp. The Israel Defense Forces said the Jabriyat outpost had been ordered in line with operational requirements. Jenin’s Palestinian Authority governor, Kamal Abu al-Rub, said he feared the land seizure could signal plans for settlers to be housed near the camp.
Along the road between Kadim and Israel, a café and dozens of Palestinian shops and businesses that had been standing weeks earlier were demolished by the Israeli army, the report said.
Source: BBC News
