AL-KHALIL, (PIC)
The Israeli occupation army has seized more than eight dunums of Palestinian land in Masafer Yatta area, south of al-Khalil in the West Bank.
Local sources reported that on Wednesday, the Israeli army delivered a military order announcing its intent to seize 8,438 square meters of Masafer Yatta land belonging to local residents near the illegal settlement of Karmiel.
Head of the Masafer Yatta villages council Nidhal Yunis said that the lands the Israeli army intends to appropriate are located at the main entrance of all the areas, villages and communities in Masafer Yatta and its pastureland.
According to Yunis, the local residents fear that the Israeli army’s control over this area will tighten the siege on their villages, restrict their movement, and increase their daily suffering.
Masafer Yatta is an area in the southern hills of al-Khalil province, which is home to 12 Palestinian villages totaling about 2,800 residents. The area spreads out over an area estimated at approximately 35,000 dunums of land, where Palestinian agricultural communities have lived for generations.
In violation of international law, which prohibits the expulsion of a population from their land and the use of occupied land for military training, the Israeli army declared the area Firing Zone 918 in the early 1980s in order to dispossess Palestinians from their homes and strengthen Jewish settlements in the area.
Since this declaration, residents have lived under the daily threat of demolitions, evictions, and dispossession. Families in Masafer Yatta are denied access to their land, roads, water sources, schools, medical services, and hospitals. This is in addition to almost daily violence from settlers in the region.
On May 4, 2022, the Israeli high court issued its final decision in the decades-long case, rejecting the residents’ petition and giving the army the green light to forcibly evict these communities at a moment’s notice. If the Israeli army moves ahead with its eviction plan, it will be one of the largest expulsions carried out by Israel in recent decades — an alarming precedent that could lead to further expulsions across the occupied West Bank.
