Tel Aviv – PNN - The Israeli Knesset approved its 2011-2012 budget on Wednesday, including two billion shekels for settlement services and security, or 3,160 shekels ($885) for each settler in the West Bank.
Israeli online newspaper Ha’aretz reported on Friday that at least 200 new residential units will be marketed in both the settlements of Ma’ale Adumim, west of Jerusalem, and Har Homa to the city’s south. Har Homa lies directly across from the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem and has been the site of controversial illegal settlement building since 1997. A total of 238 million shekels will be spent on Har Homa by 2012.
The number of settlements in the West Bank, according to the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, is 120. The World Zionist Organization says it supports a total of 136. There are half a million settlers living in Jewish settlements in the West Bank. All settlements beyond the 1949 Green Line are illegal under internatnioal law.
As for budget allotments tied to settlements but not allocated for residential units, Israel plans to spend NIS (New Israeli Shekel) 180 million on the road between the Jerusalem settlement of Pisgat Ze’ev and Tel Aviv, which human rights group Peace Now called “a clear obstacle to peace,” as well as NIS 22 million to compensate for the loss of settlement exports to the European Union. The EU no longer accepts settlement exports.
The Israel government plans to protect settler schoolbuses to the cost of NIS 31 million and “other buses” for NIS 10 million. Individual settlers can ask for personal vehicle protection at the state’s expense—at least NIS 630 is expected to be used for these allotments.
PNN - Palestine News Network - Settlers to Receive 3,160 Shekels Each for "Security Expenses" in 2011