A view of Ein Avdat in the Zin Valley of the Negev Desert. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

i24 News – Israel’s government on Sunday voted to establish a new community in the southern Negev region and examine the possibility of establishing a new city with five further communities, all to be Jewish.

Ir Ovot, the new community, will be built southeast of Beersheba, and the proposed city, if approved, would be erected near Lehavim, the Times of Israel reported.

The other five communities will be established near Route 25 in the northern Negev.

A total of 10,500 housing units are slated to be included in the communities.

Israel’s Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked, who is backing the program along with Housing Minister Ze’ev Elkin, said the decision will advance Zionist values and play a key role in the security of the Jewish state.

“Development will strengthen governance and sovereignty in the Negev and will open up the region,” Shaked said, according to the Times.

“In the face of all the security incidents, the Israeli government is … putting a stake in the ground and beginning to build Jewish towns in the Negev,” she added.

Tamar Zandberg, Israel’s environmental protection minister, slammed the initiative, saying it will negatively impact the environment and economy, and that the government should instead focus on improving existing communities.

“There is a dangerous trend of government decisions to establish new towns, which means overrunning open spaces in Israel,” Zandberg said, according to the Times. “This is a big mistake in the economic, social, and environmental sense … these decisions weaken existing cities.”

Last month, Israel’s cabinet approved five new communities in the Negev — four Jewish and one Bedouin — to be built around the southern city of Arad.