The Israeli housing ministry announced on Monday plans to build new housing units in the Ma’aleh Adomim and Beitar Illit in the West Bank in violation of its government’s own pledges before the international community to freeze construction of such units in the West Bank settlements.

The ministry said it planned the construction of 690 units, 342 in Beitar Illit and 348 in Ma’aleh Adomim.

For its part, the Israeli peace now movement said that the tender was the biggest since formation of the new government earlier this year.

The secretary of the movement said that plans for the construction of more than 750 units were declared this year, adding that the government of Ehud Olmert instead of repairing damages in the northern areas as a result of the war with the Lebanese Hizbullah was spending money on West Banks settlements.

Also in the West Bank, the IOF command ordered the confiscation of 152 dunums of Palestinian lands near Bethlehem for alleged "military purposes".

In Nablus, IOF troops stormed the city and nearby Til town and Ein Al-Ma refugee camp and arrested six Palestinians.

In the Gaza Strip, the armed wing of the PFLP fired two mortar shells at IOF positions east of Maghazi refugee camp in retaliation to IOF atrocities in lines of the Palestinian people.