JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel’s interior minister called West Bank outposts "legal settlement" during a tour of the area.
"These settlements were established by Israeli governments and approved by them," Eli Yishai of the Shas Party said Monday.
Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon of the Likud Party said during the tour that Israel should re-establish the West Bank settlement of Homesh, which was one of four West Bank settlements evacuated during the disengagement from the Gaza Strip in 2005.
"There is no doubt that this place has strategic significance," Ya’alon said.
Science Minister Daniel Herschkowitz from the Habayit Hayehudi Party and Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein of Likud also participated in the tour.
Ya’alon added that some outposts are legitimate based on the fact that they are connected to Israel’s electric and water infrastructure.
"We have misled ourselves for a long time in treating these outposts as illegal," he said. "It is simply a mistake to call them that. It is a distortion, perhaps intentional."
Two Molotov cocktails were thrown at the ministers’ convoy during the tour.
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