West Bank under a massive wave of settler terrorism and water deprivation

By: Madeeha Al-A’raj
The National Bureau for Defending the Land and Resisting Settlements stated in its latest weekly report , that in spite of the very hot weather that has swept the West Bank during the past 2 weeks, extremist settlers have ignited fires in many areas, thus, Palestinian citizens are very concerned about their property, homes, and lives as well. This comes as part of the ongoing settler attacks, as the various governorates witnessed more than 600 settler attacks over the first 6 months of this year, including the burning of homes, fields, and vehicles in more than one governorate. In this report, we provide examples, but are not-limit-ed to summarize the picture described in some detail in the violations appendix at the conclusion of the report. Settlers from the “Homesh” outpost, protected by the occupation forces, burned agricultural lands in the village of Burqa after they burned tires in citizens’ homes in the Al-Manshara and Al-Hawouz areas north of the village, which led to the burning of agricultural lands.
In another attack in the village of Burqa, settlers burned the house of citizen Raed Yassin. Hajjah was attacked with Molotov cocktails, causing parts of it to burn, before the villagers were able to put out the fire. As for the village of Burin, south of the city of Nablus, it is the focus of the settlers and their terrorist organizations in the Nablus governorate, which originates from the Yitzhar settlement.
Last week, a male and female citizen were injured in a settler attack on the town, an attack that included burning a vehicle and agricultural fields planted with olives. Also last week, in the town of Qasra, southeast of the city of Nablus, a number of citizens were injured while confronting an attack launched by settlers under the protection of the occupation army on the town. A group of settlers, who came from the terrorist settlement outpost “Yesh Kadish” and from another new outpost that was established last month, attacked In the past, 300 meters away from the town s houses, the houses of citizens in the southern area of the town, and one of the houses was set on fire, causing great material losses as a result of the fire igniting commercial shops, vehicles, hay bales, and poultry and cow farms.
Settlers intensified their attacks in the governorate and burned agricultural lands and a vehicle shed in the village of Yatma, south of the city of Nablus. Settlers also burned agricultural lands in the village of Barqa, east of the city of Ramallah, and attacked citizens’ vehicles with stones on the bypass road above the village bridge. The scene was repeated in Bethlehem Governorate, after a group of settlers burned agricultural land with an area of about 7 dunums, planted with olive, grape, and almond trees, in the “Ain Qadis” area of the village of Husan. As for Masafer Yatta, which is constantly suffering from settler attacks, a group of settlers set fire to citizens’ lands and invaded others in the area of Sadda al-Tha’ala in Masafer, and planted them with trees, with the aim of expanding the “Etzkhar Man” colony. As for the condition of the central crossings northwest of the city of Jericho, it was not better than the condition in Al-Musafer, as settlers demolished a number of agricultural facilities in the area and a number of barracks and attacked vehicles with the aim of pushing the Bedouin citizens in the area to emigrate.
The most dangerous of all are attempts to infiltrate some villages under cover of darkness in the early hours of dawn to carry out serious terrorist acts. Once again, Jewish terrorism rears its head in a way reminiscent of what happened in the village of Duma in the Nablus Governorate in 2015, when settlers attacked the village and set fire to the home of the Dawabsha family and its members while they were a---sleep---, resulting in the burning of the father, mother, and child who was not more than 18 months old, while the child, Ahmed, survived from death miraculously. For the third time since the beginning of this year, terrorist settlers committed a new terrible crime against the Palestinians, as they tried to burn family members while they were ---sleep---ing. In the early hours of dawn on June 17, settlers raided a house belonging to the citizen Mahmoud Muhammad Jabr al-Adra, in the village of Al-Deirat, east of the city of Yatta, and threw Molotov cocktails inside the house, where a family of 7 people, including 5 children, slept.
They also wrote racist slogans on the walls of the house from abroad, such as “Death to the Arabs” and “Leave with respect.” These terrorist settlers came to the village from the neighboring Karmiel settlement at 3 in the morning. They broke the window of the house and threw Molotov cocktails inside it, after writing racist slogans in Hebrew on the walls of the house. Neighbors came to help the family in putting out the fire and saved the family s life. We mention here that this criminal attempt was not the only one, but rather a repetition of targeting the same house at the end of the year ten years ago. At that time, the settlers attacked the same citizen s house and burned part of it after they broke the window glass in the living room and threw a burning canister filled with gasoline, which led to the canister exploding inside the salon, causing the gasoline to fly out and the contents of the house to catch fire. In both cases, the family miraculously survived.
In such atmosphere, Minister of the Occupation Army, Yoav Galant, last week, in coordination with heads of the Regional Councils of the settlements, conducted a field tour in the areas of “Galboa” and “Emek HaMinot,” located to the north of the city of Jenin, and launched positions that would exacerbate the situation and push the settlers to escalate their violations and terrorist practices. Gallant announced that his ministry had begun strengthening the so-called “alert teams” deployed in Israeli settlements and towns with drones and advanced weapons, and he repeated the Israeli allegations that Iran is trying to flood the occupied West Bank in general and the Jenin region specifically with weapons and ammunition, thereby justifying the occupation authorities’ strengthening of the “teams.” The field tour conducted by Gallant was aimed, according to a statement issued by the army leadership, at conducting an assessment of the situation with army officials and heads of regional councils regarding strengthening the situation in the settlements and providing them with advanced weapons and drones. Security personnel in the towns confronted various threats.
According to the statement, the aforementioned minister met with the head of the Gilboa Regional Council, Danny Ater, and the head of the Emek HaMinot Regional Council, Itamar Matiyash, and stressed the importance of cooperation between the local authorities and the Israeli army. The statement quoted Galant as saying: “We are preparing to confront any evil on the one hand, we are working intensively in Jenin, in the refugee camps and everywhere to thwart terrorism. On the other hand, we are strengthening the alert teams and intervention units that we are forming with the most advanced weapons and the best possible training, including drones and all the equipment that will be required so that they can operate and ensure immediate response until the arrival of the forces.
Terrorism, arson, and siege are one aspect of the scene in the West Bank. The other scene is the policy of oppression practiced by the occupation authorities against Palestinian citizens. The Hebron Municipality said that, at the height of the heat wave, Israel reduced the amount of water allocated to the cities of Hebron and Bethlehem by about 35%, and at the same time increased the amount of water allocated to settlers. In a statement issued by the Municipal Council, it appealed to the international community to intervene to solve the water crisis caused by the occupation, and condemned it. By trying to reduce the Palestinians’ share of water in the Hebron and Bethlehem governorates in favor of the settlers. The Municipal Council added that the reduction at this time heralds an early water crisis that would double the suffering of citizens and deprive them of their most basic rights to obtain water, the quantities of which do not normally rise to the level required for the per capita share.
The reduction in water quantities comes as an implementation of a policy whose effects have worsened under the new Israeli government, which was formed from the Likud alliance with the far-right religious Zionist and fascist parties and with the Haredi parties. It is a continuation of the thirst policy practiced by the occupying state with the Palestinians. This policy is not new in any way, as it is repeated in varying shapes and sizes every year and comes as an extension of the policy of racial discrimination practiced by the occupying state against Palestinian citizens. Everyone mentions here that at the beginning of 2023, the Israeli company “Mekorot” reduced the agreed upon daily supply quantity to an average of approximately 25% of the daily quantity in the Hebron and Bethlehem governorates. The reduction at the time was not-limit-ed to the two aforementioned governorates, but rather extended to Ramallah and Al-Bireh Governorate after reducing the quantities of water by an average of approximately 15% of the quantities agreed upon to supply the governorate, in addition to the fluctuation in water pressure in a number of areas, which led to administrative problems in distributing Water thus does not reach high areas.
The reduction in quantities also affected Nablus Governorate, specifically the areas of Sarra, Tal, Kafr Qaddum, and Jeit, which witnessed a major water shortage as a result of the reduction in water supplied from the Qaddum source, in addition to the repeated suspension of water pumping from the Beit Iba well pumping station, the main supplier to the governorate, which led to a reduction in water quantities in 11 villages supplied with water from this station.
It is known that the occupying state controls about 88% of Palestinian water sources in the West Bank, and allows illegal settlers to freely access and benefit from water sources, whether for drinking and domestic uses´-or-for agricultural and industrial projects in the settlements. International and Israeli studies have shown that the Israeli settler in the West Bank consumes nine and a half times more water than the Palestinian citizen. We mention here that the water available to the Palestinians in the West Bank amounts to 105 million cu. meters, which is less than what was available in 1995 in the Oslo Accords, which amounted to 118 million cu. meters. As for the amount of water needed according to international standards, it amounts to 400 million cu. meters, meaning that the Palestinians get a quarter of what they need.
In a different context, the United States of America announced, on the eve of Eid al-Adha, the imposition of sanctions on a settlement organization against the backof its obstruction of the entry of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. The US State Department said in its statement in this regard that members of the “Tesav 9 group” repeatedly sought to obstruct the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza, including by closing roads and sometimes using violence. They damaged aid trucks, threw life-saving humanitarian aid on the side of the road, and set fire to 2 trucks in the occupied West Bank carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza. This movement takes its name from “Tsaf-8,” which is the order issued by the occupation army to mobilize reserve soldiers in emergency situations, as happened after October 7 last year.
The organization began its work after publishing an appeal on the Facebook platform by Israelis, who were incited by well-known political leaders in Israel. As usual, the sanctions imposed by the United States on settler and violent Israeli individuals and entities target, in essence, the executive tools away from the political, spiritual and field leadership, which they -dir-ect, lead and finance in the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of National Security and other ministries such as the Ministry of Agriculture, which is responsible for Avi Dabakhter, who monitored from during his ministry, he provided lucrative sums of money to finance settlement outposts established by Zvi Bar-Yosef, Moshe Sharvit, Bar-Yosef and others, upon whom American and British sanctions were imposed, against the backof the so-called acts of violence, which they practiced against Palestinian citizens,´-or-Itamar Ben-Gvir Ben-Gvir, who clearly instructed and -dir-ectly to the Deputy Inspector General of the Occupation Police to refrain from guarding the truck convoys that were transporting humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.
“Haaretz newspaper” shed more light on this, writing: “The Ministry of Agriculture, which is headed by Minister Avi Dichter from the Likud Party, decided to allocate funding for two random settlement outposts established by settlers Zvi Bar-Yosef and Moshe Sharvit, upon whom American sanctions were imposed. The Ministry of Agriculture claims that it funds these settlement outposts in order to encourage livestock grazing. These terrorist settlers are paid NIS 1,000 for one cow in a herd of at least 50 cows, and NIS 55 for one lamb´-or-goat in a herd of at least 100 lambs´-or-goats. In addition to funding these settlement outposts, the occupying state granted an area of more than 8,500 dunams to six random settlement outposts, noting that these settlement outposts are illegal even under Israeli law. The Ministry also supports settlement associations that provide volunteers to work in settlement outposts. These associations are Hashomer Yosh, Kedma, and the Preparatory Military College in the Beit Yatir settlement in the south of Mount Hebron.
List of Israeli Assaults over the Last Week Documented by the National Bureau:
Jerusalem:
o Forcing Jerusalemite citizen, Amjad Mahmoud, to self-demolish his house in the town of Al-Issawiya, under the pretext of not having a license.
o Injuring Sinan Barakat, who owns a shop in the Old City as a result of being shot by a settler, attacked his son, and vandalized the contents of the shops, then admitted to the hospital.
Hebron:
o Notifying the seizure of more than 20 dunums in Ziv, Khallet forn and Khalayel Al-Maghribi area, east of the Yatta town, belonging to Khaled Al-Rajabi.
o Burning large areas of land in the town of Tarqumiya, west of Hebron, the fire spread to large areas of citizens’ lands planted with olive and vine trees.
o Uprooting 40 olive trees and an agricultural room belonging to the citizen Issa Khalil Hamamda, stole agricultural equipment and destroyed some property, while others attacked citizens, from the Makhamra family in the village of Susya, and forced farmers to leave their lands and vandalized olive trees.
o Chasing shepherds in Masafer Yatta in Ain al-Bayda, settlers from the "Itzkhar Man" settlement uprooted about 200 olive trees, released their livestock onto citizens lands, and stole barbed wires.
o Storming the village of Birin, east of Hebron, photographs a number of citizens’ homes, including 6 homes previously notified for demolition belonging to Saeed, Yaqoub, Ismail Burqan, Youssef Al-Ajouri, Youssef Al-Hanjouri, and Jaafar Al-Qadi.
o Destroying a sheep barn and damaged a number of trees belonging to the family. Al-Hamamda in the “Fath Sidra” area in Musafer Yatta, while others established a settlement outpost on the lands of the town of Bani Naim and erected large settlement tents in the Sha’b al-Bahrain area in preparation for establishing a settlement outpost.
Bethlehem:
o Burning agricultural lands in the Baniyas area in the Nahalin town, about 10 dunums planted with olive and vine trees, belonging to the Zayed family, in addition to agricultural land belonging to the Husan village, with an area of about 7 dunums, planted with olive, grape, and almond trees.
Ramallah:
o Attacking the Deir Dibwan and Beitin towns, and set fire to a number of homes. The fire spread to vast areas of agricultural land and a vehicle lot in the village of Barqa in the northern and western regions, an area estimated at 500 dunams, where the fire destroyed dozens of perennial olive trees.
o Storming the Bir al-Marj agricultural area, burned trees, stoned citizens vehicles, where 7 citizens were injured after settlers attacked them in the town of Deir Dibwan, and then transferred to Deir Dibwan Medical Center.
Nablus:
o Injuring 6 citizens, including a 15-year-old child, with live bullets in the shoulder, three young men with live bullets, one of them in the pelvis, a young man with shrapnel from live bullets, and another with a stone in the hand, during confrontations that broke out with the occupation forces and settlers in the Urif village, and they were taken to the hospital. 2 others suffered hot pepper gas from the village of Burqa, after settlers attacked them near the Masoudiya area, and then admitted to the hospital. Meanwhile, settlers attacked a bulldozer driver while he was working on constructing agricultural roads in the Arma area of the town, beat him, and then burned the bulldozer.
o Destroying a communications network, demolished a rest-house belonging to Bilal Kayed, and closed an agricultural road linking the town of Sabastiya with the plain area.
o buldozing a residential “caravan” belonging to the citizen Hikmat Ahmed Abu Jaish, in Furush Beit Dajan, and an agricultural pond belonging to the citizen Khairy Abu Jaish, under the pretext that it was located in areas C.
o storming the eastern area of Burin village and attacked a number of homes near Burin Industrial School, burned fields planted with olives and a vehicle belonging to the citizen Ali Odeh, and severely beaten him.
Tulkarem:
o Tourching a number of greenhouses and crops north of Tulkarem. Farmer Ahmed Yaqoub said that the occupation forces stationed at the gate of the Apartheid Wall, west of the Shweika village, fired a barrage of light bombs towards the agricultural area, causing fires in the greenhouses adjacent to the wall, which contain vegetable crops that led to their complete burning. The fire destroyed all plastic, iron, nets, agricultural equipment, motors, water and sprinkler networks, and agricultural medicines, in addition to causing major damage around the area.
Salfeet:
o Attacking citizens lands in the village Yasuf, in the Haraiq Abd al-Razzaq area, vandalizing water well and agricultural chains and closed an agricultural road. They also closed 3 main roads in Wadi al-Sukkar, Wadi al-Ain, and Bab al-Naqab, and prevented citizens from reaching their lands, which are estimated at 3,000 dunums in area.
o Handing over 2 orders to stop work in the southern area of the Deir-Balot town.
Jordan Valley:
o Stormeing the Arab Al-Malihat Community northwest of Jericho, and carried out searches and vandalism 3 homes and demolished about 10 residential barracks and others used for raising livestock in the “Al-Marajat Al-Wusta” lands, in a move aimed at seizing Their lands.
o Injuring a number of citizens while traveling on the Al-Marajat Road, where a public passenger vehicle was attacked with stones, leading to a number of its passengers being injured. They also attacked citizens’ homes in the Al-Jubiyah area in the northern Jordan Valley and assaulted the residents. The citizen, Louay Ali Zuhdi Daraghmeh, was injured as a result of the settlers’ assault. He was admitted to the Ain Al-Bayda Emergency Center for treatment.

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