Netanyahu government: West Bank settlements top priority

By ILAN BEN ZION
Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) — Benjamin Netanyahu’s incoming hard-line Israeli government has put West Bank settlement expansion at the top of its list of priorities, a day before it’s set to be sworn into office. Netanyahu’s Likud party released the new government’s policy guidelines on Wednesday, the first of which is that it will “advance and develop settlement in all parts of the land of Israel — in the Galilee, Negev, Golan Heights, and Judea and Samaria” — the Biblical names for the West Bank. The coalition agreements also included language endorsing discrimination against LGBTQ people on religious grounds, as well as generous stipends for ultra-Orthodox men who prefer to study instead of work.