Development as Burial: The Case of East Jerusalem
Written by Ben Lubitsh
Edited by Amane Tanaka
In 2018, the Israeli cabinet approved a five-year investment plan for East Jerusalem (Government Decision 3790) worth roughly NIS 2.2 billion. This was the first government decision for investment of such magnitude in the 51 years since Israel’s de facto annexation of East Jerusalem, named after its explicitly stated aim: “for the reduction of socio-economic gaps and economic development in East Jerusalem”. [1] The investment even received a follow up plan in 2023 (Government Decision 880), covering 2024-2028 and worth a larger sum of NIS 3.2 billion – itself the largest public investment in the area since 1967. [2]
It would, of course, be misleading to present this policy as a gesture of uncomplicated goodwill. But the significance of this policy is not that it signalled a sudden change in intent from the Israeli cabinet, but rather the utilisation of an overlooked tool taken from the same playbook.
In an era where Israeli ministers are often unapologetically open about their intent of territorial domination, as well as their view of Palestinians as genuine unequals, it becomes easy to base policy analysis solely on the shocking comments that make headlines. Yet the case of East Jerusalem is a good example of how doing this might miss something even more harmful: explicit neglect or destruction are not the only tools by which the Israeli cabinet strengthens its chokehold on Palestinian autonomy. In fact, the chokehold extends to things that would otherwise indicate the opposite – in this case, a commitment to investment and development.
The positive reality of the investment
It’s important to note that the investment has a legitimately positive element in at least some sense, because the rest of the analysis depends on this recognition. MAAN, the Israeli-Palestinian workers’ organisation, called the first five-year plan “groundbreaking” and a “breath of fresh air”, noting a significant rise in the construction of schools and Palestinian enrolment at the Hebrew University. [3] Ir Amim, among the plan’s sharpest critics, still described Decision 3790 in 2018 as a significant first step after decades of municipal neglect. [4] None of this is a veneer, and that is precisely what makes it worth examining.
The structural constraint
Israeli planning in East Jerusalem operates on a fixed ratio. Roughly 35% of the land has remained confiscated for Israeli settlement use, while only about 13% is zoned for Palestinian construction – much of it already built up. [5] Permits can only be sought within that 13%, and the number issued has never approached demand. Consequently, at least a third of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem lack permits, placing over 100,000 residents at risk of displacement. [6]
Illegality here is not deviance – it is a by-product of the zoning ceiling, and enforcement then falls on it. Between January and July 2025, OCHA documented 113 structures demolished in East Jerusalem for lack of permits, displacing 321 people; 70 of those structures (62%), were demolished by their owners to avoid municipal demolition fees. [7]
These numbers are a result of longstanding structural problems within the occupied territories that far predate the policy in question. However, the important question is how they continue to worsen under a multi-million-dollar investment plan designed to, in its own words, reduce socio-economic gaps and promote economic development.
Planning capacity
The first question which sheds light on this is whether the plan genuinely enables planning capacity for housing units that favour Palestinian development. Decision 880 commits to approving 2,000 new housing units for Palestinians in East Jerusalem per year over the course of five years [8] – and the plan has met this goal, just with a catch. In 2025, 152 plans comprising some 70,000 housing units were advanced for Israeli neighbourhoods across Jerusalem, including settlements in East Jerusalem. [9] On the other hand, the city’s Palestinian neighbourhoods received just eight plans comprising 3,240 units – this was under 4.5% of the total units, for a population that is 40% of the city. [10]
Two planning pipelines run through one municipality at radically different velocities. As such, the investment plan does not alter the pre-existing unequal planning ratio – it operates within it. Yet the crucial point is that the plan is still able to claim a victory on achieving its progressive aims on a technicality – even if the planning capacity runs through the same structurally unequal ratio, housing capacity still technically increases, and it delivers on its progressive promise.
The classroom shortage
Education is where this same structural design is clearest. Ir Amim’s most recent education report records 1,461 classrooms missing or substandard in East Jerusalem. [11] Decision 880 projects the creation of 1,204 new classrooms; yet just 20 were added in the most recent school year. [12]
A crucial conditionality contextualises this: under the 2018 plan, over 43% of the budget allocated to education was conditional on adopting the Israeli curriculum [13]. Under Decision 880, Ir Amim also reports that the Ministry of Education and the municipality have stipulated that any new school funded through the plan must be an “official” school, required to teach the Israeli curriculum rather than the Palestinian Tawjihi track. [14]
This is the same structure of scarce and conditional capacity, only expressed through classrooms this time. In fact, capacity has been further removed elsewhere: following two Knesset laws in force from January 2025, seven UNRWA educational institutions in East Jerusalem were closed in May 2025, affecting roughly 1,100 students, of whom Ir Amim traced only about 50 into recognised schools. [15]
Land and irreversibility
The 2018 plan also introduced a “settlement of land title” (SOLT) process for East Jerusalem. The EU’s assessment is unambiguous: SOLT, incorporated into the five-year plans since 2018, “has become the primary tool for the expropriation of Palestinian land in East Jerusalem”. [16] Of the area where registration was completed between 2018 and 2025, around 85% was registered to state authorities, the municipality, or private Jewish owners with the purpose of establishing new settlements; around 1% went to private Palestinian owners.
In February 2026, the government approved Resolution 3792, committing to complete land registration across East Jerusalem by 2029 and, for the first time, designating the Custodian of Absentee Property as an implementing authority with a dedicated budget; Ir Amim notes this as a move which “underscores the government’s intent to accelerate mass land confiscations in East Jerusalem, placing Palestinians at an unprecedented risk of dispossession and displacement”. [17]
The International Court of Justice’s advisory opinion of July 2024 held that Israeli policies in East Jerusalem are designed to remain in place indefinitely and to create irreversible effects on the ground. [18] The Netanyahu government’s staunch rejection of the so-called “decision of lies” [19] is nothing but good evidence to support the idea that the investment was designed to escape criticism by pointing to improvements, while the improvements proceed on a fundamentally sovereign premise.
Development as burial
In August 2025, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich moved to unfreeze the long-dormant E1 settlement project as a way to “bury the idea of a Palestinian state” [20] – a proposal whose practical implementation now threatens to effectively make a contiguous Palestinian state physically impossible. [21]
The particularly dark truth for Palestinians is that these investment plans have fixed the meaning of the term “development” such that it operates alongside burial. Even seemingly progressive language like “development”, “unification”, or “reducing socio-economic gaps” does not indicate a diplomatic compromise, but simply a different materialisation of the same extremist attitude. The premeditated result of this Israeli investment is that “developing” a Palestinian state and “burying” one are practically indistinguishable.
Bibliography:
Ir Amim, 2021. https://old.ir-amim.org.il/sites/default/files/Ir%20Amim%20Three-Year%20Monitor%20Report%20-%20Government%20Decision%203790_0.pdf
The Times of Israel, 2023. https://www.timesofisrael.com/cabinet-okays-843m-development-plan-for-east-jerusalem-while-other-funds-withheld/
MAAN Workers Association (WAC-MAAN), 2024. https://wac-maan.org.il/east-jerusalem-2/
Ir Amim, 2021. https://old.ir-amim.org.il/sites/default/files/Ir%20Amim%20Three-Year%20Monitor%20Report%20-%20Government%20Decision%203790_0.pdf
OCHA, 2017. https://www.ochaopt.org/content/west-bank-east-jerusalem-key-humanitarian-concerns
Ibid.
OCHA, 2025. https://www.ochaopt.org/content/humanitarian-situation-update-308-west-bank
Bimkom. Ir Amim, 2024. https://bimkom.org/media/pages/archives/12bad40718-1768309262/from-100-to-zero_eng_ej_2024.pdf
Office of the European Union Representative, 2026. https://www.eeas.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2026/documents/2025%20Report%20on%20Israeli%20settlements%20in%20the%20occupied%20West%20Bank.pdf
Ibid.
Ir Amim, 2025. https://ir-amim.org.il/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/East_Jerusalem_Education_Report_2025.pdf
Ibid.
Jerusalem Story, 2023. https://www.jerusalemstory.com/en/blog/israeli-government-bill-aims-deny-funding-palestinian-schools-east-jerusalem
Ir Amim, 2025. https://ir-amim.org.il/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/East_Jerusalem_Education_Report_2025.pdf
Ibid.
Office of the European Union Representative, 2026. https://www.eeas.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2026/documents/2025%20Report%20on%20Israeli%20settlements%20in%20the%20occupied%20West%20Bank.pdf
International Court of Justice, 2024. https://api.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/186/186-20240719-adv-01-00-en.pdf
Peace Now, 2026. https://peacenow.org.il/en/e1-tender-published-and-open-for-bidding
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