Trump Administration provides full support for Israel’s policy to seize Palestinian Land

By: Madeeha Al-A’raj
The national Bureau for Defending Land and Resisting Settlements stated in its latest weekly report , that the British daily newspaper, the Guardian published on Feb. 13, an investigation on the settlers’ violations in the West Bank, especially, those emanating from settlement outposts and terrorist pastoral farms, in which it stated that, ‘At the time, the US President Trump spoke about displacing Palestinians from Gaza – which means his actual support for ethnic cleansing there - the displacement process is taking place, not only in Area C, but also in Area B, where the attacks on the Palestinians have increased by settlers and their Israeli right-wing political supporters. Moreover, facts on the ground indicated that Palestinian Bedouin communities in the hills between Bethlehem and the Dead Sea - near the Israeli settlement of Tekoa - have been erased, and in south of Hebron, what’s left of the communities are being harassed by settler violence.
The newspaper added, according to Yoni Mizrachi, a researcher at the Peace Now Watchdog, ‘most of the evictions near the Tekoa town took place in the aftermath of the Oct. 7, 2013, where settlement activity in the West Bank has stepped up, with which the unique Palestinian culture of the hilltops has disappeared that for years was inseparable from its landscapes. Indeed, the 2014 was a record year, where 59 new illegal outposts were built in the entire West Bank i.e. 1 new outpost emerging every week, where it was previously 1 - 12 settlement outposts each year.
Furthermore, the newspaper explained that in small communities some residents stood fix in facing settlers’ confiscation of their lands. Here we are talking about thousands of dunams of land, and what is happening around Tekoa is happening elsewhere, where new areas are being cleared by settler violence,” says Yehuda Shaul of the Israeli Ofek Center for Public Affairs. In the year leading up to Oct. 7, 2003, about 100 Palestinians were displaced, after that date the number rose to 1,400. Settlement activity there was accelerated, thus, the Palestinians were unable to access their lands and pastures that now controls 12% of the West Bank.
These facts that tackled by many media means, research centers, and human rights organizations are being done under clear political cover from the new US administration. This is evidenced by US President Trump signing a presidential order on Jan. 21, 2025, canceling sanctions imposed on Israeli settlers involved in violence against Palestinians, reversing the decision of his predecessor Biden.
This step came less than a week after Biden extended the state of emergency in the West Bank for an additional year, which was in effect until February 1, and allowed for sanctions to be imposed on settlers classified by the US Administration as “involved in violence,” in addition to canceling President Biden’s memorandum that imposed restrictions on the transfer of US weapons, stipulating that they not be used in violations of international humanitarian law, and another order -dir-ected to Israel requesting that the Israeli government report potential violations of International Law related to weapons provided by the United States to allies.

The US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, and placed him on the sanctions list of the Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control ‘OFAC’. As for US President Trump, on the 7th of this month, he signed an executive order punishing the International Criminal Court for issuing arrest warrants for the occupation PM Netanyahu and his former Minister of Army, Yoav Galant, on charges of committing war crimes in the Gaza Strip.
Last Nov. the Israel Hayom newspaper reported that Marco Rubio, the new US Secretary of State, is ‘a staunch supporter of Israel, who doesn’t need to explain anything about our problems. He knows them one by one. Rubio is a predatory hawk, who will certainly stand by Israel.’ The newspaper noted that the US Secretary of State doesn’t say ‘the territories’´-or-‘the West Bank,’ but rather ‘Judea and Samaria,’ while the US Ambassador-designate to Israel, Mike Huckabee, an evangelical Zionist, declares that ‘Israel’s claim to the Judea and Samaria region is stronger than the US’s claim to Manhattan.’
The Occupying State didn’t lack such positions to continue its settlement activities and plant the West Bank with more settlement outposts and terrorist pastoral farms. However, such American positions encourage it to take more actions that challenge the international community and international legitimacy, which once called for the dismantling of all settlement outposts. Indeed, in recent years, scores of illegal farms have been established in the West Bank, through which settlers seize vast areas of land and expel Palestinians from them.
The Settlement Division at the Civil Administration, which now has the authority to manage vast areas in the West Bank, has allocated tens of thousands of dunams to settlers for grazing purposes. The matter has developed dangerously after the process began to be carried out by the Commissioner of Government Property in the West Bank, which is a body within the Civil Administration, in a precedent that is the first time that this body has allocated land to settlers for grazing, and not the Settlement Division.
The allocation of land for the benefit of settlers’ pastoral farms comes according to three devious methods, such as falling within firing zones, in whole´-or-in part, as is the case with the vicinity of the Beit Aryeh settlement, on the lands of the Luban Al-Gharbiya in the Ramallah and Al-Bireh Governorate and near the settlement of Hamdat in the northern Jordan Valley and the settlement of Yitav north of Jericho,´-or-within a nature reserve, as is the case in the northern Jordan Valley near the Goshen South agricultural outpost and the lands of the Um Zuqa Nature Reserve,´-or-even near Palestinian Communities that are being forcibly expelled from their homes.

Within the context, the Israeli Ir Amim Association says in its latest report that with President Trump’s return to the White House, Israel has revived a number of large settlement projects, such as, the ‘Atarot settlement’ project, the ‘Or Samia’ religious institute project in the Sheikh Jarrah Neighborhood, and the expansion of the ‘Nof Zion’ settlement in Jabal Mukaber. The aforementioned association adds that the Israeli government, in coordination with settler organizations, has pushed forward 6 new settlement projects in occupied Jerusalem since the inauguration of Trump AS A US President on Jan. 20.
It noted that the accelerated pace of settlement expansion shows that the Israeli government sees Trump’s return as a ‘green light’ to revive and accelerate settlement plans that were previously frozen due to international criticism. Among the six projects that were recently pushed forward are the revival of the huge settlement project in the ‘Atarot’ settlement to build 9,000 housing units-;- and the ‘Or Samia’ religious institute project in the Sheikh Jarrah Neighborhood.
In parallel with the advancement of these construction projects, the Israeli government has accelerated the displacement of Jerusalemites from their homes, according to Aviv Tatarsky, a researcher at the Ir Amim Association. He confirmed that since the beginning of 2025, the Israeli authorities have demolished 27 buildings in occupied Jerusalem, including 18 housing units, in a move that appears to be part of a systematic attempt to remove Palestinians from their homes in parallel with the expansion of Israeli settlements in and around Jerusalem. In addition, the Israeli authorities intend to demolish the entire Al-Bustan Nighborhood in East Jerusalem.

The Haaretz newspaper quoted the Ir Amim Association as confirming that the Israeli Authorities intend to demolish the entire Al-Bustan Neighborhood in East Jerusalem and displace 1,500 of its residents, despite a statement issued by the Waqf Registrar in the Israeli Ministry of Justice indicating violations, conflicts of interest, and other flaws in the position on the basis of which Palestinian families are being evicted from their homes in Silwan in favor of the Ateret Cohanim Association.
The data indicates that the ‘historical endowment’ that claims ownership of the land on which hundreds of Palestinian tenants live is in fact a fictitious entity affiliated with the ‘Ateret Cohanim’ settlement association, which is working to Judaize the Old City and the Palestinian neighborhoods in the city by displacing its Palestinian residents and steadily increasing the number of Jewish residents there.
In settlement activities, construction in the settlements continues without stopping. Recently, the Civil Administration, headed by Smotrich, published a new tender to build 974 new housing units in the Efrat settlement south of Bethlehem, by establishing a new neighborhood that will expand the Efrat settlement by 644 dunams and increase its population by about 40%. The tender consists of 2 stages, the first to build 694 housing units and the second to build 280 housing units in a nursing home after the plan to build the new neighborhood was approved last year 2024, and after allowing the so-called Israel Lands Authority time to prepare and publish the tender for its construction.
It is known that the Efrat settlement hinders the development of the city of Bethlehem to the south, and if Israel seeks to annex it to Israel, it will cut off the entire southern West Bank, which depends on connection to the West Bank via Bethlehem on Highway 60, to the east of which the Efrat settlement is located. In all negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians on permanent status issues, the Palestinians insisted that Efrat not be annexed to Israel in order to ensure the continuity of the West Bank lands and the development potential of the city of Bethlehem, which was blocked from the north and west by Israeli settlements and Israeli neighborhoods beyond the Green Line in Jerusalem.
There are 4 settlements in the West Bank: Gevaot, in Jerusalem, Itamar, in Nablus, Sha’arei Tikva, in QalqilIa and Givat Ze’ev, Northwest of Jerusalem, south of Highway 443. Of these, 756 units are planned for Geva’ot, a settlement adjacent to the Nahalin village, where about 50 families currently live, doubling its population by about 20 times. In Itamar, the council is considering 284 housing units, in Sha’arei Tikva 6 housing units, and in Givat Ze’ev 124 housing units.
Noting that since early December 2024, the Higher Planning Council has been holding weekly meetings to advance settlement housing projects, with approvals in each session ranging from several hundred to more than a thousand units. With such a shift in approval of building plans on a weekly basis, the total number of units promoted since the move to weekly approvals will reach 7,458 housing units in just three months, due to changes made by the Netanyahu-Smotrich government in June 2023 to cancel the requirement for the defense minister’s approval at each stage of the settlement progress.
List of Israeli Assaults over the Last Week Documented by the National Bureau:
Jerusalem:
• Torching a house and a vehicle in the Bedouin Community east of Jaba’ village, north of Jerusalem, belonging to citizen Daoud Musa Ka’abneh, a resident of the community, and opened fire at citizens and attacked property.
• Demolishing 2 mobile homes belonging to the Ayed and Al-Ruwaidi families in Al-Bustan Neighborhood, in addition to demolishing agricultural rooms and barracks, and bulldozed lands and roads on the eastern side of Al-Issawiya village and a house under construction in Jabal Al-Mukaber belonging to Jerusalemite Moh’d Imad Ali Sari, under the pretext of building without a permit, a house under construction in the Beit Ijza village belonging to the brothers Ibrahim and Abdul Munther Diwan, with an area of 265 square meters.
• Uprooting 100 olive trees from the plain’s lands in the Jaba’ plain, northeast of Jerusalem.
Hebron:
• Invading the Masafer Bani Naim area east of Hebron and demolished a cow shed belonging to citizen Nizam Yousef Barqan, with an area of 700m2, seized an electric generator and digging tools, and bulldozed the street there. They also plowed citizens’ lands in the Sha’b al-Batm Community, while settlers released their cattle on lands belonging to the Awad and Alian families, in Khirbet Seddat al-Thaghla, which led to the destruction of agricultural crops.
• Burning a vehicle after sneaking into the home of citizen Majed al-Dababseh and wrote racist slogans against Palestinians and Arabs in the Abu Shaban area east of Yatta,. Attacking homes and vehicles belonging to the Al-Adra and Rab’i families, in the Abu Shaban area and the Al-Tuwana village in Masafer Yatta, and threw stones at them, causing material damage to a number of them. Seized 8,438 meters of citizens’ lands adjacent to the ‘Karmiel’ settlement.
• Demolishing 18 tents and confiscated their contents, in addition to confiscating 5 generators and other electrical equipment, and destroyed water networks, during their raid on the Khallet al-Daba Community in Masafer Yatta, which housed 10 families, consisting of 80 individuals, most of whom were children.
• Attacking citizens’ property and destroyed the contents of one citizen’s home in the Beit Kahil town. Settlers also set up mobile homes on the town’s lands, in preparation for seizing them, as they moved 2 caravans near the area where the ‘Taybeh’ occupation camp is located. T
• Raiding the al-Deirat village, east of Yatta, and delivered notices to demolish two homes and stop work on another under construction.
Ramallah:
• Stealing 800 sheep in the Deir Dibwan town, east of Ramallah, after attacking the town under the protection of the occupation army, and stole the sheep, 3 horses, 2 donkeys, and water tanks, belonging to citizens Nayef Manasra and Abdul Halim Awawdeh. Confiscating a bulldozer from a citizen during their raid on the Qibya village, west of Ramallah, while he was working on agricultural land north of the village.
• Storming the Abu al-Auf shrine and the surrounding archaeological ruin in the Sinjil area, north of Ramallah, and stole boxes containing Palestinian artifacts from the site, and transported them using a closed vehicle to hide the stolen itemse.
Jerusalem
• Attacking a flock of sheep in the Kisan Desert using a tractor, and injured a number of them. Others assaulted shepherds, forced them to leave their lands, released a flock of their sheep to graze there, and set up two tents in the Al-Tina and Hajjar’ areas in the Al-Minya Desert, southeast of Bethlehem.
• Demolishing a restaurant belonging to Moh’d Sharif Najajra without prior notice´-or-warning in Nahalin village.
Nablus:
• Demolishing an inhabited house in the Majdal Bani Fadel town, south of Nablus, under the pretext of building without a permit. The house belonged to the citizen Moh’d Ibrahim Abu Zayed and his family.
• Handing over notices to empty the lands of the Duma village, south of Nablus, of agricultural rooms and crops. Head of the village council, Suleiman Dawabsheh, reported that the occupation forces delivered to the villagers more than 25 notices to empty the lands of agricultural rooms and crops.
• Storming the archaeological site in the Sabastia town, northwest of Nablus, under the protection of the occupation army.
Qalqilia:
• Torching an agricultural room in the northern part of the Kafr Qaddum village, near the settlement of Qaddumim, belonging to citizen Aqaba Obeid. They also attacked agricultural land planted with olive trees and tampered with equipment belonging to citizen Musa Obeid.
Salfeet:
• Demolishing a house belonging to citizen Mah’d Nabil Naji, which is 250m2, and a ‘barracks and retaining walls surrounding the house in the ‘Al-Sha’ab’ area west of the Kafr ad-Deik town. They also demolished the columns of a house with an area of 180 m2, and a water well under construction, belonging to citizen Hani Nabil.
• Assaulting the family of citizen Ahmed Moh’d Qara’oush, while they were on their land in the Wadi al-Ain area, and prevented them from accessing it that located between the towns of Deir Ballut and al-Lubban al-Gharbiya.
Jordan Valley:
• Stealing residential tent, and a water tank belonging to citizen Yasser Mah’d Moh’d Abu Lakbash in Humsa in the northern Jordan Valley.
• Injuring a citizen in the Khirbet Baziq in the northern Jordan Valley, after settlers attacked him while he was grazing his livestock, then he admitted to the hospital for treatment.
• Attacking citizens’ homes and crops, brought flocks of sheep between the homes, grazed them on citizens’ crops, and assaulted residents with clubs when they tried to approach´-or-object in the Shallal al-Auja Community.
• Installing monitoring cameras and set up a tent near the tents of citizens in Khirbet Samra in the northern Jordan Valley, noting that these lands belonging to Tabu of the people of Tubas.
• Attacking communities on the Al-Ma’rajat road northwest of Jericho and emptied the water tanks to deprive citizens of drinking water and prevent them from watering their livestock.
• Issuing a decision to seize 5 dunams of the Tamoun town in the ‘Jalmat Asaf’ area, located east of the ‘Baq’ot’ settlement in the area.
• Paving a settlement road northwest of the Arab al-Malihat community, west of the city of Jericho, where they placed a ‘base-course’ on the road they paved to reach the ‘Zohar’ settlement outpost adjacent to Arab al-Malihat.

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