Smotrich calls for expanding illegal Zionist settlements in West Bank

Israel's finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, known for his anti-Palestine hatred and incendiary speeches, has called for strengthening and entrenching illegal Zionist settlement in all parts of the occupied Palestinian territories.

Reacting to an agreement by the European Union on Monday to impose sanctions on illegal Israeli settlers who attack Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, Smotrich, a rabid anti-peace lawmaker, said a proper response is to expand illegal settlement activity there.

"There is one holistic Zionist response to this (EU) declaration — strengthening and entrenching settlement in all parts of the Land of Israel," he said about unlawful settlements across the occupied West Bank.

Bezalel Smotrich, widely known for his anti-Palestinian views, claimed the EU's decision is a result of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, referring to the international pro-Palestine movement that calls for making use of boycotts against Israeli occupation at all levels, Israeli media reported.

Meanwhile, Smotrich, along with Israel's National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, another Islamophobic extremist Zionist politician, threatened to withdraw from the far-right regime if any deal with Hamas includes the release of Palestinians convicted by Israeli courts of killing Israelis.

According to Channel 13, Ben-Gvir and Smotrich made the comments as an Israeli top security delegation headed for Qatar to participate in talks on a prisoner swap deal and ceasefire in Gaza.

The channel reported that the majority of the Israeli Cabinet agrees on a general framework for the deal, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has still not made a final decision.

It also quoted a minister who attended a Cabinet meeting as saying that all Cabinet members except for Ben-Gvir and Smotrich would not object to a prisoner swap deal.

In recent days Israeli Cabinet approved sending a delegation headed by Israeli intelligence chief David Barnea to Doha to discuss a possible prisoner swap deal with Hamas.

On Monday evening, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the European Union had reached a "political agreement" to sanction extremist Israeli settlers.

Borrell said a "solid compromise" had been agreed upon "at the working level" and that he hoped it would be "fully adopted soon."

Decades of Israeli apartheid and occupation

Since the start of the Israeli onslaught against Gaza on October 7, illegal Israeli settlers across the occupied West Bank have intensified their assaults against Palestinians and their properties under the watch of Israeli forces.

About 725,000 illegal settlers live in 176 "Jewish-only" settlements and 186 outposts in the Israel-occupied West Bank alongside nearly three million Palestinians living under Israeli apartheid regime and continuous military occupation.

Israel occupied the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza during the 1967 Arab-Israel. It annexed the entire East Jerusalem city in 1980.

Israel pulled back from Gaza in 2005 and has since then maintained a harsh blockade from land, sea and air on the besieged Palestinian enclave.

Palestine sees those territories as part of its country, with East Jerusalem its heartland and ultimate capital.

Under international law, the West Bank and East Jerusalem are "occupied territories" and all Jewish settlement-building activities on the land are illegal.

Palestinians accuse Israel of waging an aggressive campaign to "Judaise" the historic city by effacing its Palestinian Arab and Islamic identity and driving out its Palestinian inhabitants — one of the many reasons Hamas resistance group cited for carrying out October 7 blitz on Israeli military posts and Zionist settlements.