A guide to Israeli settlements

In the annexed areas, Israel has built large neighborhoods where nearly 200,000 Israelis now live. Israel considers those neighborhoods part of sovereign Israel. The U.S., like other countries, calls them settlements.

When did all this start?

The first settlement in the Golan Heights was quietly established by young Israelis from left-wing kibbutz movements in July 1967, with the quiet help of government officials and army officers. The first West Bank settlement, Kfar Etzion, was established by Orthodox Israelis in September 1967 with public fanfare and government backing.

What's an outpost?

The outposts are small, unofficial settlements, usually clumps of mobile homes on a hilltop, created after the government stopped approving new settlements in the mid-1990s. Though they lack legal authorization, they've received extensive help from state agencies -- as a scathing government-commissioned report documented. Under the U.S.-backed 2003 "road map" for peace, Israel is required to evacuate outposts built since 2001. So far, only a few tiny ones have been dismantled -- and settlers have subsequently rebuilt them.

So why have settlements been built?

They are intended to "establish facts" -- to ensure continued Israeli control of part or all of the occupied territory. For some settlement advocates, the main purpose is security -- to add territory to make Israel more defensible. For others, the key point is that the West Bank -- referred to as Judea and Samaria -- is part of the historic Jewish homeland. Israelis learn the Bible as their national history, and places in the West Bank such as Hebron, Bethlehem and Shiloh are the setting of much of that history. Religious settlers believe God promised the land to the Jews and that Israel's settlement of it is a fulfillment of that promise. In practice, every Israeli government since 1967 has promoted settlement -- helping to fund construction and providing financial incentives to settlers. Left-wing governments have focused on areas they considered important for security and where few Palestinians live. Right-wing governments have encouraged settlement throughout the West Bank.

Why is this a problem?