Monitoring Desk
JERUSALEM: The Israeli forces have demolished homes, olive orchards, and water tanks in two villages in the Palestinian southern West Bank, where some residents are at risk of imminent expulsion from their homes, activists, and residents said Wednesday.
One of the two villages whose structures were demolished by Israeli forces on Tuesday is part of an arid area of the southern West Bank known as Masafer Yatta, which Israel has designated as a live-fire training area. Around 1,000 residents of the eight hamlets of the Masafer Yatta are slated for expulsion, an order the Supreme Court of Israel upheld in May after a two-decade legal battle.
According to images shared by activists and residents, armoured vehicles led construction equipment to the demolitions in Main and Shaab Al-Butum, part of the Masafer Yatta area of Palestine.
Israeli military demolishes homes in Masafer Yatta
Israeli rights group Taayush’s activists, Guy Butavia said the Israeli army razed five animal pens, homes, and cisterns, spilling the contents of people’s lives out onto the cold desert.
“They come and demolish your house. It is winter, and it is cold. What is next? Where are they going to sleep that chilling night?” he said.
Since the ruling, most area residents have remained in place, even as Israeli forces periodically roll in to demolish Palestinians’ structures. However, they could be forced out at any time.
Local officials and rights groups said Israeli defense officials had informed them that they would soon forcibly remove over 1,000 more residents from the area.
“There is a general concern that a grave war crime will be committed in Masafer Yatta,” a spokeswoman for ACRI, Roni Pelli, said.
The Israeli defense body, COGAT, which deals with Palestinian civilian affairs, refused to comment.
Both villages are in 60 percent of the occupied West Bank, called Area C, where the Israeli military exercises complete control under an interim peace deal reached with the Palestinians in the early 1990s.
Tuesday’s demolition comes against a new government in Israel, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, where supporters of Israel’s West Bank settlement enterprise hold key portfolios and are expected to drive up settlement buildings and crush construction for Palestinians in the Area C.
The families living in the Masafer Yatta area say they had herded their goats and sheep across the area long before Israel occupied the West Bank during the 1967 Middle East war.
While previous Israeli governments have demolished homes in the area for decades, the current government is expected to step up demolitions in the area.
