JERUSALEM, Nov. 24 (Xinhua) -- The Jerusalem Municipality approved on Wednesday the establishment of a massive new Jewish settlement in East Jerusalem.
A spokesperson with the Jerusalem Municipality confirmed in a statement that the plan, prepared by the Housing Ministry, was endorsed by Jerusalem's Local Planning and Construction Committee.
The neighborhood is planned to be built on a site of an abandoned airport. In peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, the area was proposed to be transferred to the Palestinian Authority.
Under the plan, some 9,000 new housing units would be constructed in the new neighborhood, called Atarot.
Israeli settlement watchdog Peace Now said in a statement that the move is a "political bomb" that will "sabotage the chance for a state-state solution" for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Israel seized East Jerusalem and the West Bank in the 1967 war. The territory now is home to more than 2.5 million Palestinians and nearly 500,000 Jewish settlers who moved there after the war. Enditem