The Construction and Housing Ministry is drafting a resolution seeking to double the number of Israeli residents in the Jordan Valley.
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The resolution will be presented to the government only after the national budget is approved by the Knesset, but before the end of the 2021 work year, senior government officials told Israel Hayom. The Prime Minister's Office, the Finance Ministry and the Interior Ministry also worked on the joint resolution.
Small communities
Currently, some 1,500 families live in the Jordan Valley – most of them in small communities. In some of these places, meanwhile, the population is aging.
The goal of the government initiative is to double the number of families to around 3,000 within four years. The government will allocate NIS 90 million ($28 million) to the plan. The budget will earmark improving the physical and social infrastructure in these communities.
Additionally, the state will fund the real estate development costs for those who decide to purchase plots in the Jordan Valley.
The plan, it should be noted, does not propose creating new communities, rather expanding the existing ones. "There are more than enough communities in the area, but what's needed is to expand those that exist, not only to prevent their aging and dying but also because ultimately this offers more solutions to the high apartment prices," officials familiar with the details said.
Officials close to Housing and Construction Minister Ze'ev Elkin, who spearheaded the initiative, believe it won't cause diplomatic or political problems, because there is broad national consensus over the importance of the Jordan Valley.
Moreover, moving forward with the plan won't require approvals from the political echelon because it simply realizes plans that were already approved in the past but never were implemented.
'Just like the Golan Heights'
"The Jordan Valley, similar to the Golan Heights and the other areas along Israel's eastern strip, is of vital strategic importance to the security of the country and its future and is an inseparable part of the Zionist vision," Elkin said.
"Following the plan to double the number of residents on the Golan, now it's the turn of the Jordan Valley, which is also part of the national consensus," he added.
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