Ministers in the Israeli government have in recent months pushed for more rapid development of these settlements, explicitly as a rebuke to claims of Palestinian sovereignty.

Israel said Thursday it was moving forward with controversial plans to build thousands of new housing units in the occupied West Bank, a development far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said would “permanently bury the idea of a Palestinian state.

France has condemned Israel’s plan to build 3,400 new homes in the occupied West Bank, calling the project a “serious violation of international law” that risks destroying any chance of a contiguous Palestinian state.