The Jerusalem Governorate said that the agreement announced earlier this month by the so‑called “Ministry of Construction and Housing” in the Israeli occupation government—allocating funds for nearly 2,780 colonial units near the Adam colony north of occupied Jerusalem—constitutes a deliberate annexation scheme presented as a routine development plan.
It stressed that the plan functions as a deceptive mechanism to extend the occupation’s municipal reach beyond the Green Line, forming part of a calculated strategy to impose new sovereignty arrangements on the ground without an official declaration.
In its statement issued Monday, the governorate said that branding the project as an “expansion of Adam” is intended to obscure its actual purpose.
Planning documents indicate that the new colonial neighborhood would, in practice, fall under the administration of the occupation’s Jerusalem municipality, despite being formally described as an extension of the colony—an effort to mask annexation behind misleading planning language.
|Israel Greenlights New Step Toward De Facto Annexation|
The governorate noted that the plan calls for hundreds of colonial units on land geographically detached from Adam and currently lacking any direct access routes to it, despite earlier proposals to construct a bridge linking the two areas.
Construction in this zone, it added, would create direct geographic continuity with occupied Jerusalem, effectively transforming the project into an extension of the Neve Yaakov colony designated for ultra‑Orthodox colonizers.
The planned access road begins and ends in Neve Yaakov, thereby expanding the occupation’s municipal footprint in practice.
According to the governorate, the acceleration of the project followed sweeping colonial measures introduced by the extremist occupation finance minister Bezalel Smotrich within the so‑called “Civil Administration,” including new mechanisms designed to fast‑track approval of colonial projects across on more confiscated Palestinians the occupied West Bank—steps that could enable implementation within a short timeframe.
It emphasized that these actions expose the occupation’s policy of gradual annexation and the imposition of de‑facto sovereignty, forming part of a broader effort to reshape the geographic and demographic character of occupied Jerusalem and undermine any political solution grounded in international law.
On February 3, the so‑called “Ministry of Construction and Housing” announced the signing of an agreement worth nearly 120 million shekels to build approximately 2,780 new colonial units, along with roads, infrastructure, and various facilities near the Adam colony established on Palestinian land north of Jerusalem.
All of Israel’s colonies in the occupied West Bank, including those in and around occupied East Jerusalem, are illegal under International Law, the Fourth Geneva Convention, in addition to various United Nations and Security Council resolutions. They also constitute war crimes under International Law.
Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits collective punishment and acts of terror against civilian populations.
Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states: “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” It also prohibits the “individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory”.
Articles 53 and 147, prohibit the destruction of civilian property and classify pillage as a war crime.
