Arab News<\/a>\n <\/p>\nRIYADH: Saudi Arabia and seven other countries have severely condemned Israel\u2019s decision to start land registration in parts of the occupied West Bank, which would allow large areas to be declared \u201cstate land.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Kingdom\u2019s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan was joined on Tuesday by Jordan, the UAE, Qatar, Indonesia, Pakistan, Egypt, and Turkiye in denouncing the move as a \u201cgrave escalation\u201d that will undermine the two-state solution.<\/p>\n
The Israeli government approved the process on Sunday for the West Bank\u2019s Area C for the first time since 1967. It would mean that if Palestinians cannot prove ownership, Israel would be able to register the land as property of the state.<\/p>\n
The foreign ministers\u2019 statement said the move was aimed at \u201caccelerating illegal settlement activity, land confiscation, entrenching Israeli control, and applying unlawful Israeli sovereignty over the Occupied Palestinian Territory and undermining the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.\u201d<\/p>\n
The statement added that the measures represented a \u201cflagrant violation of international law,\u201d including an International Court of Justice advisory opinion that deemed attempts to alter the legal, historical, and demographic status of the territory as illegal.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis step reflects an attempt to impose a new legal and administrative reality designed to consolidate control over the occupied land, thereby undermining the two-state solution, eroding the prospects for the establishment of an independent and viable Palestinian State, and jeopardizing the attainment of a just and comprehensive peace in the region,\u201d the ministers said.<\/p>\n
They called on the international community to take action against Israel\u2019s violations and protect the right of Palestinians to an independent state on the lines of the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital.<\/p>\n
Israel has been ramping up efforts to exert its control over the West Bank.<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, the Security Cabinet approved measures that would make it easier for Jewish settlers to buy land in the territory and expand Israeli powers there.<\/p>\n
The latest announcement has been widely condemned both by Arab and Islamic countries, the EU, the UN and Israeli human rights groups.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kingdom\u2019s foreign minister joined by Jordan, UAE, Qatar, Turkiye, among others, denouncing Israel\u2019s \u2018grave escalation\u2019 Israeli Cabinet approved…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":296095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-296094","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-il","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/296095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}