DONALD TRUMP’S tenure as US president has prompted a sharp increase in illegal settlement construction by Israel on occupied Palestinian territory, Israeli group Peace Now has revealed.

The organisation monitors settlement activity in three areas, “plans” when new building is proposed, “tenders” when contractors bid for the actual work and then construction itself. 

Since most construction follows decisions taken in previous years, an apparent drop in building in 2017 (with 1,643 units compared to 3,066 in 2016) reflected pressure placed on Israel to slow settlement expansion by the previous Barack Obama administration, Peace Now said.

But the 6,712 new homes in the “plan” stage for 2017 showed the impact of the new US administration, which has ceased to object even formally to settlement building — the figure is two-and-a-half times the number of homes planned in 2016. 

And 2017 saw 3,154 tenders issued, compared to just 42 in 2016, with the figure rising to more than 3,800 in 2018, the highest number since Peace Now started compiling data in 2002.

“The feeling of the government is that everything is allowed, that the time to do things is now because the US administration is the most pro-settlement you can ever have,” Peace Now’s settlement watch programme activist Hagit Ofran said.

Oded Revivi, mayor of the illegal settlement Efrat, agreed, welcoming a “change of atmosphere” after the “standstill” on settlement he attributed to Mr Obama (in fact, the number of Israeli settlers on West Bank land increased by over 100,000 during the Obama presidency).