Defense Minister Ehud Barak will approve by Monday evening construction of 500 new housing units in settlements in Judea and Samaria, Defense Ministry officials confirmed on Sunday evening.
This approval will come prior to the government's expected declaration of a settlement moratorium, part of a package the US administration is trying to put together to relaunch the diplomatic process, Jpost reported.
Although the Defense Ministry did not say where the homes would be built, the assumption is that most would be in the large settlement blocs - Modi'in Illit, Ma'aleh Adumim and Gush Etzion.
Information and Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein said that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had told him that some of these units, however, would be built in settlements outside the large blocs