Ma’aleh Adumim, one of the largest Jewish cities in the West Bank, is set to double it’s population and with an addition of approximately 7,600 housing units in an investment of around NIS three billion ($890 million), Construction and Housing Minister Haim Katz (Likud) announced on Sunday.
The umbrella agreement is set to be signed this Thursday with the Prime Minister’s Office, the Construction and Housing Ministry, the Finance Ministry, and the Ma’aleh Adumim Municipality.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is reportedly set to join the Thursday meeting in which the signing will take place.
Ma’aleh Adumim Mayor Guy Yifrach said in a Sunday Army Radio interview that it is currently a “golden opportunity” to apply sovereignty in the West Bank.
However, he added that there was no agreement for Netanyahu to make such a declaration at the signing.
“I would be happy if he surprises us,” Yifrach said.
The announcement of the signing comes after Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich presented a plan on Wednesday calling for the annexation of 82% of the West Bank. He called on Netanyahu to support him in the move.
West Bank annexation a 'red line' for many
The United Arab Emirates subsequently said that any annexation of the West Bank would constitute a redline for Abu Dhabi that would severely undermine the spirit of the Abraham Accords, which normalized relations between the two countries.
Netanyahu then removed the issue of applying sovereignty to the West Bank from his agenda on Thursday, following the response from the UAE.
The new umbrella agreement in Ma’aleh Adumim is expected to include the planning and construction of about 7,606 new housing units on state land, alongside the development of commercial and employment areas totaling about 20,000 square meters of main space.
Approximately NIS 420 m. ($125 m.) of the NIS three billion investment is expected to go toward upgrading major infrastructure, such as roads, drainage, water, sewage, electricity, and transportation in the new neighborhoods.
Another NIS 340 m. ($100 m.) is set to be allocated for the establishment of public institutions and the development of community services, including in the older neighborhoods.
Katz called the decision “a historic agreement and the first to be signed in Judea and Samaria, as an integral part of my policy of significant investment in Jewish settlement.
“We will add thousands of new housing units, public buildings, advanced infrastructure, and neighborhoods that will enable a high quality of life and provide substantial responses to public needs,” he said.
During the Oslo Accords signed between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the 1990s, the territories were split into three different designations: Area A, chiefly Palestinian towns and cities that are under full security and civilian control of the PA; Area B, which is under Israel’s security control but Palestinian civilian control; and Area C, which is under Israeli security and civilian control.
Smotrich had also approved a major construction project in the West Bank in August, marking a significant expansion in Ma’aleh Adumim in an area known as E1, which is located in Area C.
Regarding his E1 approval, Smotrich said during the press conference on Wednesday that, “For years we were told that if we [approved] young settlements, the Middle East would go up in flames; that if we approved construction in E1, the so-called ‘powder keg’ of the Middle East would explode.
“We did it, and thank God nothing happened,” Smotrich said. “That is exactly what will happen with sovereignty.”