Report on Israeli Settlement in the Occupied Territories

Israel is stepping up its effort to enclose Jerusalem with a ring of barriers and settlements designed to sever Palestinian East Jerusalem from the West Bank.

Supporters of an early return to Israeli Palestinian peace talks were encouraged by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s announcement before her recent trip in March to the region that a “political horizon” was needed to break the seven year stalemate.

During 2006, settlement expansion occurred throughout the occupied territories and on both sides of the separation barrier. Israel’s Interior Ministry reports that during 2006 the settler population in the West Bank increased by 5.8 percent, from 253,371 to 268,163.