Palestine warns: hundreds of thousands of settlers in Jerusalem are being prepared to obtain weapons.

Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir announced on Monday that 41 neighborhoods in occupied Jerusalem have been added to the list of areas eligible to obtain licenses to possess personal firearms.

“Palestine warned on Monday about the repercussions of Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s announcement that hundreds of thousands of settlers in Jerusalem have been added to the list eligible to obtain weapons, some of whom live in settlement outposts inside Palestinian neighborhoods”

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He wrote on his X account that Israelis owning firearms is an important element in enhancing personal security.

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He said the decision would make more than 300,000 settlers in Jerusalem eligible to apply for a gun license.

He noted that more than 240,000 Israelis have obtained personal gun licenses during his tenure and based on the policy he has followed since taking office in late 2022.

Among the areas Ben-Gvir mentioned are settlement outposts located in the heart of Arab neighborhoods, especially in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.

The Jerusalem Governorate condemned Ben-Gvir's announcement as "racist incitement and a very dangerous step that would open the door to committing more crimes against Palestinian citizens."

It said the policy represents "public and official incitement to murder and to committing crimes outside the rule of law" and "gives extremist hardliners a license to take the law into their own hands in line with their extremist ideology based on hatred and racism toward Palestinians."

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The governorate said 140 citizens in Jerusalem were killed over the past five years, about half of them children, "as a result of official incitement policies and the systematic violence practiced by the occupation forces and settlers."

It argued that the rise in settler crimes shows a pattern of "organized state terrorism."

It held the occupation government fully responsible and called for immediate international action to disarm settlers and protect Palestinians.

It urged the UN Security Council, the European Union, the United Nations and its agencies, and states party to the Geneva Conventions to assume their legal and moral responsibilities.

Palestine National Council President Rawhi Fattouh described the expansion of arming settlers as "a serious escalation and a call to commit more murders against Palestinians."

“Palestine warned on Monday about the repercussions of Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s announcement that hundreds of thousands of settlers in Jerusalem have been added to the list eligible to obtain weapons, some of whom live in settlement outposts inside Palestinian neighborhoods”

Al-Jazeera Net

He said the decision reflects "an extremist political doctrine based on arming settlers, inciting them, and unleashing them in occupied Jerusalem."

He called it "an open invitation to extremist forces to carry out more organized attacks against the Palestinian people, their property, and their holy sites."

He added that, through these policies, "the occupation government... seeks to undermine any political horizon for a just and comprehensive solution, and is rapidly working to entrench a colonial reality based on power and racism," which he said threatens to ignite the situation in Jerusalem and across the occupied Palestinian territories and undermines prospects for stability in the region.