Settlement excitement: For the first time since 2012 - an increase in the population's annual growth rate • More than 15,000 residents were added to the area - 3.4% increase • Yesha council chairman: "Marching for the vision of a million residents"

• Ma'aleh Redum houses // Photo: GettyImages

Excitement in Judea and Samaria: After six years of alarming and permanent decline in the rate of population growth in Judea and the Jordan Valley, in 2019 there was a 3.4% increase in population in the area. While this is not a big increase, it is a nice increase. The Yesha Council attributes this to the relatively fast pace of construction in the area.

These figures come from the population register for the population of Judea and Samaria in 2019, which are published, as every year, at the beginning of the civil year and reached "Israel Today". The data analysis shows that the annual growth rate of the Yesha population in 2019 was 3.4% a year - more than twice the average annual growth rate in the State of Israel at 1.9% at the beginning of 2020. As mentioned, the annual growth rate in the Yeshiva represents an increase, following a downward trend that began in 2012 , Then the annual growth rate was 4.7%.

The figures also show that the increase in the number of persons in the Yesha increased from 12,964 in 2018 to 15,229 residents in 2019. In fact, in the last decade the settlement in Israel has increased by 152,263 residents and this is an increase of more than 48% in ten years. In all, in 2019, the population of Yesha is 463,901, residing in 150 localities.

The largest settlement in Yesha, which is not a council or city, is also this year, Kochav Yaakov in Benjamin, after which they maintain their position as last year - Gates of Hope in Samaria, Adam, Talmon and Kfar Adumim.

Another interesting figure is the fact that the highest growth was recorded in the small kibbutz Beit Arava in the Megilot Regional Council. The kibbutz has maintained a steady growth rate in recent years, with the addition of young families, but if last year its growth rate was 16%, this year it more than doubled with an impressive growth rate of 36.5%.

Also in 2019 the population of Judea Samaria and the Jordan Valley is younger than the national average. According to national election figures held this year, about 48% of Yesha residents are over the age of 18, while in the entire State of Israel 71% are over the age of 18.

David Alhaini, chairman of the Yesha Council, said in response that "we are moving forward towards the Yesha Council's vision for one million residents in Judea, Samaria and the Jordan Valley." He said that about half a million residents, together with the double average national growth rate, require Applying sovereignty to Israeli settlement in the region, to allow Israeli citizens legal rights as in the rest of the country, along with fixing Israeli presence in the Bible land. "