Israel granted final approval on Thursday to a plan to build 800 homes near the Gilo neighborhood of Jerusalem, with tenders for construction likely to be published within a few months, according to a Peace Now activist quoted by Agence France Presse. Hagit Ofran, director of the leftist group's Settlement Watch project, said the plan to build west of Gilo had been published for validation in an Israeli newspaper in what is the last phase of the planning process.

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