Israeli man buys Palestinian new bike

“We have been proud to rally the Israeli-American community to pass this legislation, which will protect California’s diverse communities from discrimination-now and in the future”.

Israel said remarks by the U.N. Mideast envoy “distort history” after he declared that Israel’s settlement-building is a main obstacle to peace with the Palestinians.

“It is clear to the federal government that the illegal expansion of settlements in occupied areas is a serious threat for the two-state solution”, a Foreign Office spokesperson said in a statement.

“We are particularly troubled by a policy of retroactively approving illegal outposts in unauthorized settlements”.

Settlements in the West Bank are considered illegal by global law, but since the beginning of Israel’s 1967 occupation, approximately 570,000 Israelis have settled there.

The approvals mostly involved new housing units, but a retroactive green light was also granted to 179 existing homes in the Ofarim settlement.

On Monday, Nickolay Mladenov, the United Nations’ coordinator for the Middle East, told the UN Security Council that construction in the settlements had surged in the past two months.

Roughly 500,000 Israelis now live on more than 100 Jewish-only settlements built since the Jewish state first occupied the Palestinian West Bank and East Jerusalem in 1967.

“We are deeply concerned by the government’s announcement to advance plans for these settlement units in the West Bank”, U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said at a news briefing in Washington.

The global community regards settlements as a key obstacle to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, because they are scattered throughout land the Palestinians want for an independent state.

Meanwhile, the government considers Area C, the 60 percent of the West Bank under its administrative and security control, disputed territory and thereby rejects the global community’s position on settlements.

Peace efforts have been at a complete standstill since a US-led initiative collapsed in April 2014.

Witnesses said a large number of Israeli troopers surrounded the house of the Palestinian prisoner, Mohammed Abdulmajdi Abriwash, in the town of Dura, located 11 kilometers Southwest of al-Khalil, amid clashes with dozens of stone-throwing young Palestinian men, Arabic-language Safa news agency reported. “What is needed is a practical step that forces the Israeli government to freeze its settlement activities that threaten to destroy regional and worldwide efforts to resume the peace process”.