It seems an unlikely new front in the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict: a rocky hilltop, barren except for a few excavators glinting in the hot sun.
They are laying the foundations for Israel’s first new settlement since the 1990s. It will eventually house hundreds of people forced to leave their homes in Amona, a wildcat outpost that stood for nearly a decade near Ramallah.
The new settlement, called Amichai, is a reminder of the obstacles facing President Trump as he pursues an unlikely push for peace.
Amona was built on privately owned Palestinian land, and Israel’s Supreme Court ordered its demolition in 2014. Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, took two years to strike a deal with residents: they would leave peacefully, and he would relocate them at state expense.
Read the report by Gregg Carlstrom (The Times) in The Australian.