Ras Karkar villagers in western Ramallah continue to show admirable determination to not abandon or cede an iota of their ancestral land despite their exposure to different forms of terrorism and violence at the hands of extremist Jewish settlers — who receive backing and protection from the Israeli military regime in the occupied West Bank.
As other areas of the West Bank this village is also exposed to several Israeli violations aimed at taking over its land specifically Mount Raysan for settlement expansion activities.
Recently the Israeli occupation army issued an urgent military decision — signed by chief of the central command Yehuda Fox — to seize five dunums of land in the area of Mount Raysan which is located on land belonging to Ras Karkar village and other Palestinian villages near Ramallah.
According to this military decision the land would be used for security purposes and would be under full control of the Israeli army’s central command in the West Bank. A map was also attached to this written decision showing the exact location of this appropriated tract of land.
Farmers from the village have always appealed to Palestinian institutions to support their steadfastness on their own land against Israel’s settlement expansion plans and help them save what remained of their land but to no avail.
They called for necessarily providing them with every financial and moral support to help them reclaim and farm their lands and carry out projects on them in order to strengthen their presence in the area.
“We are the owners of this land which we inherited from our fathers and grandfathers and we will continue to live and die on this land and will not give up an inch of it” one of the local farmers said.
The farmer stressed the importance of supporting the villagers to remain steadfast on their land through helping them to carry out agricultural projects accusing the competent Palestinian authorities of neglecting their area.
He also called for helping the villagers prevent illegal Jewish settlers from encroaching further on their land especially on Mount Raysan which he described as “greatly important” to the local residents.
Over the past decades the villagers have lost most of their land to illegal Jewish settlements which encircles their village from three sides according to chief of the village council Radi Abu Fakhida.
About 2200 people live in Ras Karkar village and they are prohibited from building outside Area B — which is according to Oslo accords under Palestinian civil control and Israeli military control. However Jewish settlers have repeatedly violated the accords by spreading into Area B and seizing private Palestinian land for cultivation and settlement.
For long years the village has been seeing protests against Israeli settlement expansion and clashes with Israeli forces and armed settlers.
