LONDON: Israeli authorities have finalized the issuance of tenders for 3,401 housing units planned under the E1 settlement project near Jerusalem, which will divide the occupied West Bank and hinder the possibility of a territorially connected Palestinian state. The Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission said that the move coincided with the campaigning for the Israeli elections, set to take place on Oct. 27, in which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is competing to remain in power with his right-wing, pro-settlement coalition. The Israeli government froze the E1 settlement plan after it was first proposed in 1994 due to criticism from Western countries. But that changed in August of last year when it received approval and funding from Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who said that the initiative “buries the idea of a Palestinian state.” The commission said that moving from plan approval to offering tenders was “a significant step toward implementation, bringing the project closer to creating physical facts on the ground,” the Palestine News Agency reported. Last week UK Foreign Minister Ed Miliband described the tenders for the E1 project as “a red line” while announcing sanctions on settler leaders and on trade with settlements in the West Bank. In 2014 Miliband visited the Palestinian community of Khan Al-Ahmar, which is situated between East Jerusalem and the Ma’ale Adumim settlement. He warned last week against the “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinians and cautioned about the establishment of facts on the ground that could render the two-state solution “unviable.” Several Bedouin communities call the arid slopes between Jerusalem and Jericho home, including Khan Al-Ahmar, which could be cleared to make way for the E1 settlement.