By building settlements confiscation for military purposes building the Apartheid Wall and bypass roads the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) occupy the lands of the beautiful town of Al-Zawiyeh that is located in the heart of the northern West Bank city of Salfit. Recently the occupation targeted the town’s lands by announcing a plan to build a cemetery for its settlers.
Day after another Israel continues taking over the land of the town that is under Israeli occupation and oppression using its various arms.
Surrounded from three sides
With sorrow farmer Abdullah Shukair says most of the land of the town has become in the hands of the occupation and its settlers. The occupation surrounded the town from three sides with settlements the Apartheid Wall military outposts and bypass roads.
According to Jamal al-Deek a resident of Salfit the new confiscated land is located near the settlement outpost of Majid Dan to the west of the town of Al-Zawiyeh. The occupation has already issued declarations to build a cemetery there expanding its military barrier and building an industrial zone.
A cemetery for settlers
As for confiscations Mayor of the village Na’im Shuqair said: “The town of Al- Zawiyeh whose lands have been seized by a number of settlements the Apartheid Wall and a cemetery for settlers and bypass roads have been strangled by such schemes. This however has not satisfied the occupation which confiscated its best fertile lands and made the inhabitants of the town live in catastrophic conditions and unable to find a solution to the expanding settlements.”
He adds to the PIC: “The targeted area is known as Khalayil Seressia located on the western side of Al-Zawiyeh. The occupation claims that confiscating the lands has to do with the security need of the area “and the municipality received notification from the so-called commander of the occupation army in the West Bank notifying them of confiscating the area called Basin-4 for military purposes with the occupation giving landowners the right to object to the confiscation decision at the court within six days.”
Settlement researcher Khaled Ma’aleh said that the new Israeli notifications in the area suggest the accelerated pattern of settlement construction a new escalation in the settlement project. The town of Al-Zawiyeh is the most affected among the villages of Salfit in terms of settlement expansion he added.
He referred to a previous decision to confiscate the lands of the town of Al- Zawiyeh in order to build a cemetery for Israeli settlers which can accommodate 35000 bodies after filling the cemetery of the settlement Barkan built on the lands of Salfit which will meet the needs of settlers for the next 25-50 years and will be the largest in the occupied West Bank.
He pointed out that Al-Zawiyeh according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics has a population of about 6033 people according to the general census of the population of 2017. Highway 5 was built on its lands in addition to the settlements of Magen Dan and Alkana. Recently funds were allocated for the construction of a railway to link the settlements of Salfit with the 1948 occupied Palestinian territories.
