Israeli ministers approve $1.5m for West Bank settlement

The Israeli cabinet yesterday approved a NIS 6 million ($1.5 million) aid package for the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba to refurbish public areas and advance educational programming.

The funding boost will be drawn from the Housing Ministry budget, 10 days after 13-year-old Hallel Ariel was stabbed to death in her bed in Kiryat Arba, as the government has sought to respond to terror by pushing settlement projects.

Some NIS 4.5 million ($1.1 million) will be used in 2016 and 2017 to renovate local buildings, public areas and stairwells.

The remaining money will be funneled toward educational programming, the founding of a youth centre and other local community initiatives over the course of three years.

“It is our responsibility to empower the residents of Kiryat Arba and strengthen the local community, particularly at this time, days after the inconceivable murder of a girl in her sleep in the settlement,” said Housing Minister, Yoav Galant (Kulanu).

The government approval appeared to be the first installment of a reported NIS 50 million ($12.8 million) plan for Jewish settlements in the West Bank city of Hebron and nearby Kiryat Arba.

Following Ariel’s murder, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he would push through approval for 46 new homes in Kiryat Arba, TimesofIsrael said.

He and Defense Minister, Avigdor Liberman, also approved hundreds of new housing units in Ma’ale Adumim and East Jerusalem in response to the killings of Ariel and Rabbi Miki Mark in a drive-by shooting near Hebron a day later.

The State Department on Tuesday responded to the construction by accusing Israel of the systematic seizure of Palestinian land. In an unusually strongly worded statement, spokesman John Kirby said the reports of new building permits being issued called into question Israel’s commitment to the two-state solution.