(JNS) “We said there will be no Palestinian state—indeed there will be no Palestinian state. This place is ours,” declared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to rousing applause at the festive signing of an “umbrella agreement” between the government and Ma’ale Adumim at the Judean city’s Cultural Center on Thursday evening.

The umbrella agreement commits the government to finance the construction of two new neighborhoods and the expansion of a third in a city that hasn’t seen a new neighborhood built in 20 years.

In repudiating a Palestinian state, Netanyahu referred to the most strategically important part of the agreement—the building of a new neighborhood in E1 (“East 1”)—an area, once built, both Israel and the Palestinians agree threatens Arab geographic contiguity, making it far more difficult to establish a viable Palestinian state.

Various obstacles, chief among them international pressure, have left E1, a 12-square-kilometer (4.6 sq. mile) area in Judea, virtually untouched for decades, despite support for construction by every Israeli government starting from Yitzhak Rabin’s in 1994, which first proposed the idea.

It is little wonder then that Ma’ale Adumim, which this year celebrates the 50th anniversary of its founding, turned the signing of the umbrella agreement into a celebratory event with music and dancing.

About 500 people, mostly locals, attended, waving Israeli flags and cheering on the prime minister, the city mayor, Guy Yifrach, Minister of Construction and Housing Haim Katz and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, all of whom signed the agreement.

Other ministers who attended were Minister of Environmental Protection Idit Silman, Education Minister Yoav Kisch, Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli, Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi and Ze’ev Elkin, a minister in the Finance Ministry.

The umbrella agreement provides for 7,000 new housing units, enough to house 30,000 residents. Ma’ale Adumim is currently home to 40,000.

“[T]his is about to realize the doubling of the city of Ma’ale Adumim. There will be 70,000 people here in five years. That will be a huge change,” Netanyahu told the audience.

Ma’ale Adumim Mayor Guy Yifrach speaks at the umbrella agreement signing ceremony in his city. Seated from left are the Construction and Housing Ministry’s Director-General Yehuda Morgenstern and Minister Haim Katz, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, Sept, 11, 2025. Photo by David Isaac.

The agreement provides 500 million shekels ($150 million) for infrastructure (this will include improvements to the entire city) and 700 million shekels ($210 million) for developing the two new neighborhoods—E1 (3,400 housing units) and Tzipor HaMidbar (“Bird of the Desert”) (3,500 units).

The funding will be provided via the Ministry of Construction and Housing.

Another 300 million shekels ($90 million) will be provided for educational facilities. In addition, the agreement calls for an additional 300 housing units for the existing neighborhood of Mizpeh Nevo.

Netanyahu said he was genuinely happy to attend the event, in part because it called up memories of when he first visited the hills of Ma’ale Adumim in 1967 as a young army officer to learn to navigate. “The best place to learn to navigate—it’s here, because the hills were completely naked, and you could see the topography, the mountains, the wadis,” he recollected.

The prime minister invited the city’s former mayor Benny Kashriel, a legendary figure in Ma’ale Adumim, to the stage to take part in the ceremony. Netanyahu recalled the time they walked on one of the hills and Kashriel pointed out where neighborhoods would go and asked the prime minister to approve them.

“I said, ‘I approve,’ but between approving and executing in the State of Israel—wow!—It can take a very long time. That’s why something very big is happening here today,” Netanyahu said.

Yifrach, in a 20-minute speech punctuated by numerous rounds of applause, described growing up in Ma’ale Adumim, his love for the city and its people—“the most community-minded there is.”

He highlighted the city’s industry, spirit and sense of service (he said Ma’ale Adumim leads in the percentage of IDF reservists reporting for duty after the Oct. 7, 2023 attack).

The mayor had insisted that the umbrella agreement include preferences for reservists to purchase homes at subsidized prices. “It’s our obligation to the young generation, the generation of victory,” he said.

Yifrach said the umbrella agreement, the first for a city in Judea and Samaria, was “historic.” “It is an enormous honor for Ma’ale Adumim.”

From left, former Ma’ale Adumim Mayor Benny Kashriel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and current Ma’ale Adumim Mayor Guy Yifrach at the Ma’ale Adumim Cultural Center, Sept. 11, 2025, Photo by David Isaac.

International pressure remains strongly against Israeli construction at E1, with 25 foreign ministers from Europe and other countries condemning Israel in a joint statement on Aug. 22 in which they called for the “immediate reversal” of the decision.

However, Israel has held firm.

The Foreign Ministry rejected the joint statement as an attempt to “impose foreign dictates.” It described as racist the demand by the foreign ministers that Jews stop building while placing no similar restrictions on Arabs.

“The historic right of Jews to live anywhere in the Land of Israel—the birthplace of the Jewish people—is indisputable. There is no other nation in the world that has a stronger, longer-standing and better-documented connection to its land than the Jewish people has to the Land of Israel, and this connection and right do not require the affirmation of foreign governments,” the Foreign Ministry said.

Yifrach expressed his view to JNS on Aug. 27 that international pressure would be canceled out by the friendly administration that occupies the White House.

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