The state notified last week that it intends to begin, in 45 days, construction of the “Sovereignty Road” between Elazariya and A-Za‘ayem, which will result in the closure of the entire Ma’ale Adumim and E1 area—about 3% of the West Bank—to Palestinians. The announcement was sent to attorney Neta Amar-Sheif, who represents the Municipality of Elazariya and the Bedouin communities of Jabal al-Baba, Wadi al-Jamal, and A-Saraiya, which petitioned against the construction of the road. The planned road is intended to create a separate road system for Israelis and Palestinians (an apartheid road), which will enable Israel to close off a vast area in the heart of the West Bank to Palestinians by diverting Palestinian traffic to a special bypass route, and to annex the entire Ma’ale Adumim and E1 area to Israel.
Peace Now: The Netanyahu government is condemning us to continued conflict, bloodshed, and the destruction of the State of Israel. This is an apartheid and annexation road whose construction must be prevented. Its sole purpose is to allow Israel to take final and absolute control over the heart of the West Bank and to remove any Palestinian presence from it. There is no intention whatsoever to improve Palestinian transportation, but only to enable the annexation of a vast area—about 3% of the West Bank—to Israel. These are very bad news for Israel and for the Palestinians, as they may mean the elimination of the possibility of ending the conflict and achieving a two-state solution.
Background
Since the construction of the separation barrier around Jerusalem in the early 2000s, the main Palestinian transportation route between the northern and southern West Bank— which until then passed through the Palestinian neighborhoods of East Jerusalem—has been severed. Since then, Palestinians have been forced to bypass East Jerusalem from the east: traveling from Bethlehem northeast toward Abu Dis and Elazariya, from there eastward along the Ma’ale Adumim settlement (on Road No. 1), and then north toward the village of Hizma and from there to Ramallah. Palestinians are thus compelled to make this major detour precisely in the heart of the largest Palestinian metropolitan area in the West Bank, stretching from Ramallah through East Jerusalem to Bethlehem, home to nearly one million Palestinians, and which was supposed to be the beating heart of the West Bank and of Palestinian economic and social development.
Israeli governments have sought to prevent the development of the heart of the West Bank for Palestinians. To this end, the settlement of Ma’ale Adumim and the surrounding settlements were established, and for the same reason the government is vigorously advancing the construction of the new settlement in E1 and has even published a tender for its construction. Taking control of the heart of the West Bank and creating a break in Palestinian territorial contiguity would eliminate the possibility of developing a viable Palestinian state; therefore, for years heavy international pressure has been exerted on Israel to refrain from building in E1.
The bypass route that Palestinians are forced to take between the southern and northern West Bank passes through the very area that Israel seeks to take over, near the Ma’ale Adumim settlement (on Road No. 1). In order to remove the Palestinian presence along the road and in the surrounding area, the government now seeks to build a new road for Palestinians that will divert Palestinian traffic away from the Ma’ale Adumim area. Once the alternative road is constructed, Israel will be able to close the entire area to Palestinians. In effect, the planned road will enable Israel to annex the entire Ma’ale Adumim and E1 area and remove Palestinians from it.
For this reason, when then–Minister of Defense Naftali Bennett announced in 2020 the initiation of plans for the road, he called it the “Sovereignty Road,” because it would allow Israel to annex and apply sovereignty over a vast area of the West Bank. Another name given to the road by the security establishment is the “Fabric of Life Road,” as it is intended to allow Palestinians to maintain a basic fabric of daily life after Israel closes the entire area to them. However, it seems that the most appropriate name for the road is in fact the “Apartheid and Annexation Road,” because it is designed to create separation between Palestinian and Israeli traffic and to enable annexation.
The road also has another significant advantage from the perspective of settlement development: because Palestinians travel on Road No. 1 together with settlers in the area, Israel has placed a checkpoint between Ma’ale Adumim and Jerusalem to prevent Palestinian vehicles from entering Israel. This checkpoint, located near the village of A-Za‘ayem, creates heavy traffic congestion for thousands of settlers who commute daily to work in Jerusalem and gives drivers the sense that they are outside Israeli territory. Paving the new road (and closing the existing road to Palestinians) will allow Israel to remove the checkpoint and shift it eastward, outside the Ma’ale Adumim area.
The goal: Apartheid and Annexation
In a statement issued by the mayor of Ma’ale Adumim a few years ago, he explicitly and without diplomatic language revealed the true goals of the road: “This is a separate road for Palestinians in the E1 area whose purpose is to separate the transportation route between the Palestinian and Israeli population in the area, so that Palestinian vehicles can move without passing through Ma’ale Adumim Bloc, near Jewish settlements.” The message continues and explains the political implications of the road: “In the political sphere, the road will connect Jerusalem and Ma’ale Adumim and enable Jewish settlement construction in the E1 area.”
In an interview with Channel 13 in April 2025, his words were summarized as follows: “Without Palestinians – Israeli contiguity between Maale Adumim and Jerusalem.”
Former Mayor of Maale Adumim: “Without Palestinians – Israeli continuity from Maale Adumim to Jerusalem”
The impact on Palestinian communities
The construction of the road will have a deadly impact for the future Palestinian State and on the entire area in the heart of the West Bank. In addition, will also have a fatal and direct impact on Palestinians living near or within the area.
Dozens of Bedouin communities, like al-Khan Al-Ahmar residing within the area will be cut off from the rest of the West Bank, essentially by not having any access road to link them with the rest of the West Bank. This might lead to the displacement of thousands of Palestinians residing today in those communities.
Moreover, the communities of Wadi Jamal and Jabal Al-Baba, located near the planned road, which consist of hundreds of Palestinians, will be cut off from their surroundings due to the construction of the road. It is unknown how they will be able to cross the road and reach their own homes.
Furthermore, the road passes over established houses in the community of A-Saraiya, which is located in Area B. This means that these houses will be demolished. The demolition of the houses, like the entire process, is carried out by virtue of military seizure orders, that allows the Israeli authorities to temporal use of the land for security needs.
Residents of these Bedouin communities, together with the municipalities of Elazariya, Abu Dis, and Sawahra, petitioned the High Court of Justice (HCJ) in 2021 when the intention to pave the road was first announced. In response to the petition, the state argued that the petition was premature, and it was agreed between the parties that when there was an intention to carry out the construction, the petitioners would be notified in advance and given time to object.
Now, the Legal Advisor for Judea and Samaria has sent a letter to attorney Neta Amar-Sheif, who represents the petitioners, informing her of the construction of the road and granting her a period of 45 days to object:
“We hereby inform you that the military commander intends to implement the seizure orders … in light of the security need and the directive of the political echelon on the matter. It is clarified that, in accordance with the state’s undertaking in the above-mentioned petition, the seizure orders will not be implemented until at least 45 days have elapsed from the date of this notice.”
Bypassing the Planning Process
Officially, the planned road is defined as a “security road”. By being defined as a security road, it is not brought for planning approval in the Higher Planning Council of the Civil Administration. Subsequently, the public is not given the opportunity to object to it, as in a formal planning process.
Seemingly, this is because the State of Israel has no official authority to plan this road as significant parts of it pass through Area B (see map). According to the 1995 Interim Agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, planning authority in Area B is given only to the Palestinian Authority. To bypass this, the Ministry of Defense chose to define the road as a security road. The lands taken for its construction do not go through a process of confiscation for public purposes, but rather a process of military seizure, and the planning process is done behind closed doors.
Israel’s Plan: Transportational Contiguity in Place of Territorial Contiguity
The new road is intended to allow Palestinians to cut through the Adumim Bloc along a wall and as in a kind of tunnel. Once the road is paved, Israel can then claim that construction in E1 does not sever the West Bank because the Palestinians have an alternative transport route. This argument is preposterous. A thin line of road connecting separate territorial sections–transportational contiguity–does not meet the needs for territorial viability for the development and livelihoods of Palestinians in the critical Ramallah-Jerusalem-Bethlehem metropolitan area. Without actual territorial contiguity, an independent Palestinian state cannot be established and prosper, and therefore a two-state solution cannot be reached.
The two-state solution depends on the possibility of establishing a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel. The heart of the future Palestinian state geographically, economically, and culturally is in the metropolis between Ramallah, East Jerusalem and Bethlehem. One of the only potential development areas left for this metropolis are the areas east of Jerusalem, in the same area where Israel seeks to build the E1 settlement and create an Israeli territorial continuum from Jerusalem eastward that would effectively cut the West Bank in half.
See more about the issue in our report and video here.
