ISRAELI settlers last Tuesday night attacked Palestinian homes with stones as they provocatively approached the outskirts of Silat ad-Daher, some 20 kilometres to the south of Jenin in the northern West Bank, security sources told WAFA.
The settlers, who also chanted racist slogans against Arabs and Palestinians, provoked a scuffle with angry local Palestinians who forced them out of the area. The village is close to what was known as Homesh and Sa-Nur, two Israeli settlements which were evacuated after Israel’s unilateral disengagement from Gaza and four other settlements and a military base in northern West Bank in 2005.
On July 30, some 200 settlers organised an overnight hike to the former settlement in an attempt to resettle there before they were forced to leave by the Israeli army. According to Israeli media, among those who attempted to reoccupy the former settlement were families who were evicted in 2005 as well as rabbis, public figures, and MK Bezalel Smotrich from the nationalist Jewish Home party.
During the settlers’ provocative visit to Sa-Nur, which is adjacent to Nablus-Jenin highway, settlers assaulted passing Palestinian vehicles with stones and provoked tension in the area. Meanwhile on Tuesday night, settlers entered the village of Hares near the town of Salfit, in central West Bank, and pelted Palestinian homes with stones before local Palestinians gathered in an attempt to confront them.
According to local sources, the settlers had also some Molotov cocktails in their possession, which means they were plotting a malicious act. But after locals attempted to confront them, an Israeli army force arrived on the scene and ordered the settlers out of the area. Violence by illegal Jewish settlers is commonplace. They have repeatedly attacked Palestinian property and worship places.
Settler violence includes property and mosque arsons, stone-throwing, uprooting of crops and olive trees, attacks on vulnerable homes, among others. Only last Friday, a group of Jewish fanatics killed an 18-month-old Palestinian baby and seriously injured his entire family, during a pre-dawn arson attack which targeted two homes in the village of Duma, south of Nablus.
The baby’s father, Sa’ad Dawabsheh, his mother Riham and his 4-year-old brother Ahmad sustained third degree burns and were transferred to several hospitals in the city of Nablus to receive immediate medical care.
• The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA, has warned in a report addressed to the United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, that ‘unless funding for the full amount of the Agency’s General Fund shortfall of $101 million is secured by the middle of August, the financial crisis may force the suspension of services relating to the Agency’s education programme’.
‘This would mean a delay in the school year for half a million students attending some 700 schools and eight vocational training centres across the Middle East,’ the report adds. The report states that ‘as things currently stand, with stringent austerity and management measures having been put in place, the Agency should just about be able to continue with services that are life-saving, protect the most vulnerable refugees from extreme hardship, and maintain public health and safety until the end of the year.’
The agency said it will nevertheless be able to continue to run its health programme, as well as assistance to impoverished families through the relief and social services programme, sanitation, and emergency activities. UNRWA Commissioner-General Pierre Krähenbühl expressed grave concern that the ‘measures may be required at a time when the Agency’s services remain essential to Palestine refugees, their rights and their dignity, and when education has been globally recognised as essential to overall human development.’
He said it was ‘of particular concern that such measures could be necessary at a time of growing instability throughout the Middle East and when the role of UNRWA is increasingly significant.’ The Commissioner-General underlined that in presenting this report, the Agency is seeking to draw attention at the highest levels of the international community to the consequences for Palestine refugee children: ‘Nothing is more important for these children in terms of their dignity and identity than the education they receive. We are simply not allowed to let them down.’
The special report goes on to set out proposals for putting UNRWA on more secure financial footing in future years. These include an emergency flash appeal, a pledging conference in October to secure funding for 2016 and a discussion involving United Nations member states that will lead to sustainable funding for UNRWA. UNRWA, which is the only source of livelihood for thousands of refugee families in Gaza, has in recent months experienced an unprecedented financial crisis.
On January 27, the international group declared it was forced to suspend its cash assistance programme in Gaza to tens of thousands of people for repairs to damaged and destroyed homes and for rental subsidies to the homeless. It said that while $720 million is required for rental subsidies and repairs to over 96,000 Palestinian refugee families, whose homes were damaged or destroyed during last summer’s conflict, UNRWA so far received only $135 million in pledges, leaving a shortfall of $585 million.
• Israeli authorities on Wednesday demolished 18 Palestinian-owned agricultural structures in northern Jordan Valley, as well as handed Palestinians near Hebron demolition notices for 20 houses, and demolished a home in Beit Ummar, according to local sources. Motaz Bisharat, in charge of the Jordan Valley settlements file in the Palestinian Authority, said Israeli army forces broke into al-Aqaba, Mayta, and Yazra, small villages in the northern Jordan Valley, and demolished agricultural structures used as storage sheds and as animal shelters, in addition to two residential structures. Forces further uprooted an electricity pole in the village of al-Aqaba.
In Hebron, forces demolished a 60-square-metre house in the town of Beit Ummar without any prior notice, displacing eight family members. The house belongs to local Azmi al-Ajloni. Meanwhile in al-Arroub refugee camp, north of Hebron, Israeli army and bulldozers demolished a house under construction, citing unpermitted construction as a pretext.
The army also notified Palestinians in the camp of their intentions to demolish 20 homes under the same pretext. Both villages are located in Area C, under complete Israeli military control, where Israel rarely grants construction permits for Palestinian locals, forcing many of them to embark on construction without obtaining permits.
According to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, Israeli authorities prohibit Palestinian construction in vast areas of Area C citing various rationales, such as ‘defining these areas as state land, survey land, firing zones, nature reserves and natural parks, or by incorporating lands into the jurisdiction of settlements and regional councils.’
Most Palestinians are forced to build without a permit to meet their needs. In many cases, displacement is due to cumulative pressure created by a combination of factors, including settler violence, movement restrictions (including the Barrier) and restricted access to services and resources, said OCHA.
It said that, ‘Despite a decline in the number of structures demolished in 2014 compared to 2013 (601 vs. 663), the number of people displaced increased by almost 10 per cent.’ Four houses were demolished on punitive grounds in 2014 for the first time since 2005, added OCHA. On average 64 structures were demolished in 2015 on a monthly basis in the first three months of 2015, which is higher than its equivalent figures in 2014 and 2013 (51 and 53, respectively, reported OCHA.
Meanwhile, B’Tselem estimated that from 2006 until 30 June 2015, Israel demolished at least 876 Palestinian residential units in the West Bank (not including East Jerusalem), causing 4,105 people – including at least 2,011 minors – to lose their homes. To be noted, Israel is planning to annex the Jordan Valley into a completely Israeli area, primarily in agriculture, targeting to ban territorial contiguity between a future Palestinian state and the rest of the Arab world.
