Kadim Settlement Reopens Amid International Backlash
Thirty pioneer families from Tel Aviv arrived in Kadim, a former Jewish settlement shut in 2005, on Thursday. The group was flanked by Israeli soldiers and carried blue‑and‑white flag‑macros suspended from their cars, while trailers loaded with bedding, furniture and building materials rolled up the dusty hilltop behind Palestinians’ fields.
"21 years after the expulsion from northern Samaria we have corrected this mistake and are returning to Kadim," Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich declared at the ceremony, referring to the Biblical name for the northern West Bank.
The reopening follows the Israeli government’s reversal of a twenty‑year ban that once prohibited settlement activity around Jenin. The ban was part of the 2005 unilateral disengagement that removed settlers from Gaza and three other West Bank outposts, a move that Palestinians hailed as a victory over annexation.
Local residents now watch the new settlers through a crush of fear and resentment. A village farmer recalled, "Back then we co‑existed peacefully, but now I am afraid of the events spreading, of the bypass road that was used to demolish shops and cut down trees for the unapproved home sites."
International observers bluntly warn that the outpost remains illegal under both Israeli and international law, and its re‑establishment signals a broader drive by the current ruling coalition to expand West Bank holdings in the run‑up to the October elections.
For the Palestinian community, the move means yet another upheaval: the loss of access to farmland, a feeling of displacement that hovers over a generation, and a clear message that the region’s future is a political dispute rather than a negotiated peace. The story of Kadim's return is a micro‑image of escalating tensions that continue to ripple across the occupied Territories.
