The Settlement Monitor summarizes and provides links to reports and news analyses, released during the quarter 16 May-15 August 2017, that pertain to Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights. This quarter's selections provide evidence that Israeli annexation, land appropriation, and settlement construction continue to advance unchecked: among the selections, an Israeli newpaper's investigative report that, as part of a 2014 “framework for peace” by then-U.S. sec. of state John Kerry, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded that Israeli settlers be allowed to remain in areas of the West Bank under the jurisdiction of a future Palestinian state; Peace Now provided data indicating that U.S. Jews were disproportionately moving into West Bank settlements; Haaretz reported that Netanyahu supported a bill that would de facto annex settlements into Jerusalem; and Peace Now's annual construction report documents that settlement construction starts in 2016 rose 34% compared to 2015.
