Despite outrage from its allies, the White House has not commented on a report that found famine in Gaza. Analysts say that without U.S. pressure, Israel’s war will not likely change course.

Settlement development in E1, an open tract of land east of Jerusalem, has been under consideration for more than two decades, but was frozen due to U.S. pressure during previous administrations.

E1 begins on the eastern slopes of the Mount of Olives and runs along the road towards Ma’aleh Adumim. Every Israeli prime minister since Yitzhak Rabin has planned and promised to build there for salient reasons: municipal and strategic imperatives that only have grown with time.