CURRENT AFFAIRS

Detailed explanation-1: -Israel occupied the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in 1967 and has since maintained control.

Detailed explanation-2: -Most legal experts and the United Nations agree that Israeli settlements in the West Bank violate international law. The 1949 Geneva Convention, which Israel signed, prohibits an occupying state from moving its own civilians into the territory it occupies.

Detailed explanation-3: -Palestinian territory – encompassing the Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem – has been illegally occupied by Israel since 1967.

Detailed explanation-4: -After Israel and the PLO signed the Oslo Accords, the West Bank was divided into three areas of control. The occupied West Bank was divided into three areas – A, B and C – as part of the Oslo Accords, signed by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel in 1993 and 1995.

Detailed explanation-5: -Israel has cited several reasons for retaining the West Bank within its ambit: a claim based on the notion of historic rights to this as a homeland as claimed in the Balfour Declaration of 1917; security grounds, both internal and external; and the deep symbolic value for Jews of the area occupied.