Israeli governments have become very adept over the years at methodically expanding their hold on the West Bank while publicly declaring plans to freeze controversial settlement development that is a major obstacle in any peace deal with the Palestinians.

More than once, Israel has secured newspaper headlines for declaring a "freeze" on settlements in the West Bank.

But what exactly does Israel mean when it says it is freezing settlement construction?

In practical terms, as McClatchy recently noted, Israel's settlement "freeze" is almost meaningless.

That became ever-more clear this week when Israel resurrected de-facto plans to develop a new settlement deep in the West Bank.

So, let's take a look at what Israel says - and what it really means.

Israeli policy, as outlined by PM Ehud Olmert spokesman Mark Regev, is this:

1. No new settlements.

That sounds definitive. But, in fact, Israel has not officially established a new settlement in at least a decade.

Israel contends that the tentative plans to build nearly two dozen new homes in the Jordan Valley do not violate that pledge because there has been a military presence there for 25 years.

Soldiers first staked a claim to the land in 1982. It has been used for years as a small religious school and given the go-ahead in 1986 to become a new settlement.

For a variety of reasons, it never happened. Only a few religious students lived at Maskiot.

In 2005, after Israel closed all its Gaza Strip settlements, the government allowed some of the Gaza settlers to move to Maskiot, where they were given the OK to set up new mobile homes.

Under US pressure, Israel put plans to develop Maskiot on hold. Until this week.

One major issue here is Maskiot's location in the Jordan Valley, the farming area that borders Jordan.

Israeli plans to move more settlers to the Jordan Valley suggests that the Olmert government wants to hold onto land about as far into the West Bank as you can go without hitting Jordan.

That reinforces Palestinians suspicions that Israel is trying to further whittle into the West Bank land that could become part of a Palestinian state.

2. Regev: "No outward expansion of existing settlements."

That might sound like there will be no growth of existing settlements. But that's not what it means.

All it means is that Israel won't approve development beyond existing settlement boundaries. But existing settlement boundaries often cover large swaths of undeveloped land.

So Israeli settlements continue to expand by building on disputed West Bank land well outside the settlement centers. New apartment buildings are going up on West Bank hilltops and in valleys well-outside the heart of existing settlements.

Israel has also challenged international pressure by building a major new police station on a hillside next to Maale Adumim. The station allows Israel to contend that it is not building new homes on the contested land. Palestinians have long argued that building on this area, known as E-1, would cut off the northern part of the West Bank from the southern part.

As with Maskiot, Israel has established a foothold on the disputed land that will give it a chance to expand its presence there over time.

3.  No confiscation of private land to build settlements.

The key qualifiers are "private" and "settlements." Israel continues to confiscate West Bank land to expand its network of fences and walls, checkpoints and roads for settlers.

4. Regev: "The Israeli government has gone farther than any previous Israeli government to bring under control unchecked growth in the settlements."

The key qualifier in this statement is "unchecked growth." Olmert is more closely regulating development, but he is approving aggressive growth in West Bank settlements that Israel expects to retain in any peace deal.

Although the Bush administration Road Map calls on Israel to stop all settlement growth, Israel continuously ignores this aspect of the agreement by arguing that it is assumed that Israel will hold onto its biggest West Bank settlements and thus should be allowed to continue building.

Israel's Maariv newspaper noted this week that the Israeli population in the West Bank is growing faster than the population growth in Israel.

According to Israeli population figures, the paper reported, more than 15,000 new Israelis moved into the West Bank in the last year - a 5.5 percent jump. Inside Israel, the population has grown by less than 2 percent.

As of now, there are 290,000 Jewish residents in the West Bank.

Earlier this year, Olmert announced that he was going to approve every West Bank project.

So far, Olmert has given the green light to every plan that has been presented to him by the Housing Ministry. After McClatchy reported this fact, the Israeli government rejected our requests for a list of settlement plans from the Defense Ministry that had been approved or rejected by Olmert.

To this day, Olmert's government has offered no evidence that it has turned down any settlement plans.

In trying to make his case a few weeks ago, Regev urged McClatchy to contact the mayor of Ariel, who complained that the freeze was choking off growth in his settlement.

Last week, Israel quietly gave Ariel permission to build more than two dozen new factories.

5. Jerusalem.

Most of the major building taking place now is happening around Jerusalem on land Israel annexed after the 1967 war. Israel contends that building around Jerusalem is different from building elsewhere and should not be viewed as settlement expansion.

US and UN officials have urged Israel to stop building around Jerusalem because it undercuts the fragile peace talks with the Palestinians.

Israel politely disagrees with the statements and continues to build.