Ganim settlement reopens in occupied West Bank

Israel officially reopened the Ganim settlement in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, more than 20 years after evacuating the community under a 2005 disengagement plan.

About two dozen pre-fabricated homes had already been installed at Ganim, where construction machinery was preparing more space for future houses on the hillside.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz attended the ceremony after arriving by helicopter. “Here, this is the Land of Israel. Here, we are staying forever,” he said.

Ganim was one of four Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank that Israel evacuated under former prime minister Ariel Sharon’s disengagement plan in 2005, partly because of their isolated location among Palestinian cities and villages in the north of the territory.

Under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, settlement construction and expansion have increased, including with the official re-establishment of three of those evacuated communities: Ganim, Sa-Nur and Homesh.

About 100 people from Israel and other West Bank settlements attended Thursday’s ceremony, including Yossi Dagan, head of the Israeli authority in charge of settlements in the northern West Bank. “The era of evacuation is over — from here, we only build,” Dagan said.

Palestinians living in the valley below Ganim said they feared the construction would make their lives harder or eventually lead to displacement. Along the road leading to the settlement from Israel, the army has demolished stores in recent days and blocked several dirt roads to Palestinian communities with piles of rubble.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967. More than 500,000 Israelis live in settlements in the territory, which are illegal under international law, among about three million Palestinians.

Violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians has increased since the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip.