February 19
Maale Adumim is declared the first Israeli city in the territories.
November 22
The newly elected Rabin government decides to freeze settlement activity in the territories, except within the borders of the existing communities and based on approved outline plans. Order No. 1385, issued a few months later, freezes all planning processes for building in the territories. The government’s decision is considered to have spurred the appearance of illegal outposts established by Israeli settlers in the Occupied Territories that start to appear in the mid-1990s and that increase in numbers during the beginning of the next decade. From 1992 to 1996, the years of Labor Party rule, no new settlements are built. However, the number of settlers grows by 40 percent, reaching one hundred and forty thousand, not including the Jerusalem area.
December
Following the kidnapping and killing of a border policeman by Palestinians, Israel deports 415 Hamas members to Lebanon. One group of deportees returns in October 1993 and the others two months later.