Facts on the ground

Facts on the ground is a diplomatic and geopolitical term that means the situation in reality as opposed to in the abstract.
The term was popularised in the 1970s in discussions of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict to refer to Israeli settlements built in the occupied West Bank, which were intended to establish permanent Israeli footholds in Palestinian territory.
Rashid Khalidi wrote in 2010: 
Further reading.
Gershom Gorenberg, "The Accidental Empire: Israel and the Birth of the Settlements, 1967-1977", Macmillan, 2006