Since its occupation of Palestine in 1948, ‘Israel’ has been sparing no effort towards building a Jewish state only, not beside a Palestinian one, but on the original lands and property of those indigenous Palestinians who should be displaced either by forces or through Indirect expulsion methods.
Deliberate attacks on the Palestinian houses, livelihoods, schools, and water sources are nothing but Israel’s persistent trials to tighten the grip on Palestinians and force them out of their lands, threatening their very existence and stripping them of their rights to live in dignity.
Simultaneously, Israeli occupation has been advancing, from time to time, dozens of Judaization projects, under which tens of thousands of new colonial settlement units will be constructed, all pour into altering the demographical features of the population in the Palestinian territories.
Settlers’ Incessant Attacks
It was hard for Suleiman Nasr, a 44-year-old shepherd, to dismantle his tent that sheltered his seven-member family dwelling in the Qaboun hamlets east of Ramallah for 45 years.
A cluster of Palestinian Bedouins, including the Qaboun community, hailed from the southern lands of the Naqab, from which they were expelled by Israeli forces in 1948. Almost five decades later, they were compelled to evacuate their ancestral lands, once again, due to the incessant onslaught by both the Israeli soldiers and colonial settlers.
These Bedouin communities are in the crosshairs of systematic settlers’ attacks, on a daily basis, clamping down on camps and livestock. The settlers usually hurl stones in people’s direction, subjecting children, women and the elderly to violence and verbal abuse.
“These assailants wield batons and sharp implements against us, all while attempting to steal our livestock,” said a villager, describing these attacks as “unbearable”.
Such onslaughts usually stem from the Israeli settlements near indigenous Palestinians’ communities. According to the Qaboun community, they have been under attack from the Israeli settlement of Shilo, strategically positioned between the cities of Ramallah and Nablus.
Shilo also incited against the Kaabneh family, forcing 36 members to forcefully disassemble their tents, pack up their belongings, and relocate to an uninhabited area nestled between the villages of Al-Mughayyir and Abu Falah, east of Ramallah.
Last May, 78 children from the Ein Samia community were forced to depart due to ongoing Israeli transgressions, including the demolition of several of their homes and the only school in the community.
In the town of Khan al-Ahmar, which received notice of imminent demolition by ‘Israel’s Supreme Court’, a Palestinian boy was filmed under harassment and attack by a security coordinator of the Gush Adumim settlement. When the boy tried to flee, the settler who was armed chased after him and yelled at him: “Sit here and don’t move.” Two women near the land attempted to intervene to protect the child, yet they were arrested by Israeli forces.
Nearly 700,000 settlers live in more than 250 settlements and outposts across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem in violation of international law, threatening the Palestinian existence and pushing for their displacement.
On September 25th, 2023, a report issued by the United Nations revealed that over 1100 Palestinian citizens had been forcibly displaced due to the escalating Israeli settler violence against the Palestinian people since 2022, revealing that, on average, there were three settler attacks per day in the first eight months of 2023.
Demolition of Houses, Schools and Villages
There are many pretexts Israeli occupation could find to expel Palestinians from their places, some of which cite construction works underneath the holy sites and wide areas, in addition to “building without permits” allegations and imposing punitive measures against Palestinian freedom fighters involved in resistance operations.
In doing so, hundreds of Palestinian houses and commercial facilities as well as educational institutions have been razed, seized, or demolished.
Since the 2023 outset, the Israeli occupation demolished, seized or forced people to demolish more than 170 Palestinian-owned structures across the West Bank and occupied, presenting allegations such as “building without a permit”, and displacing hundreds of Palestinian families, including children. In 2022, Israeli occupation forces forcibly demolished more than 209 inhabited Palestinian facilities and confiscated a number of Palestinian-owned lands and properties in favour of Israeli settlers’ expansion.
One of Israel’s methods to displace Palestinians is to limit students’ prospects and access to independent education and, more importantly, cut their dreams of having a regular education life. This coincides with attempts to Israelize the curricula and increase attacks on education sources.
Months ago, in the town of Kafr Malik, east of the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, Israeli forces demolished a Palestinian school that serves a local Bedouin community, just days after Israeli settlers launched a series of attacks on it, leaving desks in classrooms upturned and damaging resources. The learning process was then disrupted and students were confined to homes as this school is the town’s only learning facility. The town’s population reaches around 500 people and they had previously been displaced from other areas by Israeli forces and settlers.
Earlier this year, near Bethlehem, Israeli forces bulldozed another Palestinian school in Jabbet al-Dhib village, drawing heavy criticism from the EU, which said it was “appalled” by the destruction of an establishment it had funded. In August this year, three Palestinian schools were demolished and nearly 40 were threatened with demolitions.
In Masafer Yatta, up to 1,200 Palestinians are still under Israeli threats of displacement in favour of Israeli military training. Last May, an Israeli ruling lit the green light of the Israeli occupation army to start evacuating the Palestinians from their homes. Since then, dozens of Palestinian homes have been demolished.
In Salfit’s village of Bruqin, Israeli bulldozers have razed dozens of dunams of land belonging to Palestinian citizens, some of this land has already been seized for the benefit of settlements such as “Brukhin,” “Ariel Industrial Zone,” and “Barkan,” as well as the new pastoral outpost.
Water Apartheid
Israeli occupation authorities attempt to seize Palestinian water sources and move them directly to nearby colonial settlements in a bid to legitimize these Jewish-based outposts and drive people out of their lands.
In the late of this month, Israeli settlers hailed from the ‘Sha’arayim Tzofim’ settlement released large quantities of wastewater towards the lands of the villages of ‘Azzun Atma’ and ‘Beit Amin’ in the southeast of Qalqilya. These waters inundated vast agricultural lands planted with plenty of olive trees.
Two months earlier, Israeli forces with heavy bulldozers raided Palestinian farmland in occupied Hebron and poured large amounts of concrete into the water sources, aiming to stop agricultural irrigation in an area that serves 25 families. Local residents said the forces destroyed the water walls without any prior warning and poured concrete instead.
The Palestinian human rights group Al Haq described this policy, in 2013, as “Water Apartheid”, confirming that these perilous acts promote the displacement of the Palestinian population and represent “only one element of an irreversible structural process that can only be described as colonial”.
The institution then reaffirmed that Israel’s policies with regard to water sources violate peremptory norms of international law and constitute breaches of the international legal prohibitions of colonialism and apartheid.
Israeli-linked Crimes in 1948-Lands
Since the start of 2023, over 170 Palestinians living in the 1948-occupied territories fell victim to murder crimes, often described as “mysterious and systematic”, according to Palestinian sources.
Such crimes, including shooting and Freud, are carried out, on a daily basis, at the hands of unknown masked persons, who continue with their atrocities without accountability.
On September 2nd, 2023, Sheikh Sami Abdul Latif was killed in front of the Al-Quba mosque in Kafr Qara’ following a reported shooting crime, which targeted Sheikh Abdul Latif while leaving a funeral house. At first, he was severely injured then he was proclaimed dead.
As the perpetrators receive no deterrents from the Israeli side, they are encouraged as such to commit more and more crimes, which brings only destabilization and insecurity within these communities.
Experts anticipate that the increasingly systematic crimes are organized with the full complicity of the Israeli security service, which controls these lands, in a bid to dismantle the social bond of citizens of 1948 communities, pushing towards their dramatic flee of their houses, businesses and social life.
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