Israeli far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has said plans to build more than 3,000 homes in a controversial settlement project in the occupied West Bank will “bury the idea of a Palestinian state”.

The so-called E1 project between Jerusalem and the Maale Adumim settlement has been frozen for decades amid fierce opposition internationally. Building there would effectively cut off the West Bank from occupied East Jerusalem and significantly obstruct its territorial contiguity.

Smotrich said it would thwart the idea of a Palestinian state “because there is nothing to recognise and no one to recognise”.

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“This is Zionism at its best - building, settling and strengthening our sovereignty in the Land of Israel.”