Israel Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich boasted that the construction could thwart Palestinian statehood plans

Israel’s far-right finance minister said Thursday that a contentious new settlement construction in the Israeli-occupied West Bank is going ahead — a project that Palestinians and rights groups worry will scuttle plans for a Palestinian state by effectively cutting the territory into two parts.

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said that an Israeli settlement plan is not in line with international law, and she called on Israeli authorities not to move ahead with it.