REUTERS/Carlos Barria

BET EL, West Bank (Reuters) - For many in the Israeli settlement of Bet El, deep in the occupied West Bank, Donald Trump's choice of Jared Kushner as his senior adviser on the Middle East is a sign of politics shifting in their favor. The prime minister has said he sees the Trump presidency as offering "significant opportunities" after facing "huge pressures" from Barack Obama. “It is a black day for Zionism.”

On a nearby hilltop, Issa Zayed, a Palestinian who said he was one of the owners of the land on which Amona was built, watched the scene through binoculars. Israeli police dragged nationalist youths out of a barricaded synagogue on Thursday, completing the forced evacuation of an illegal outpost in the West Bank even as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised to build evicted families a new settlement. "While we don’t believe the existence of settlements is an impediment to peace, the construction of new settlements or the expansion of existing settlements beyond their current borders may not be helpful in achieving that goal," the White House said in a statement. Palestinians want to establish a state in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, which Israeli forces and settlers left in 2005, with East Jerusalem as its capital. The international community considers all Jewish settlements on occupied Palestinian land as illegal and regards their construction as the biggest obstacle to a peaceful settlement of the conflict.
Israel announces it will build an entirely new settlement in the West Bank for the first time in about twenty years. Many in the international community believe that such settlements are illegal but Israel disputes that. The settlement program is illegal under international law.