Demolitions and confiscations in communities facing expulsion

As part of the military training that took place in the western Jordan Valley beginning on 25 January 2022, in which troops destroyed dozens of dunams of crops, three cows belonging to a resident of Khirbet Tall al-Himma, were hit by shell fire on 7 February 2022 in Khirbet Jabaris, west of al-Farisiyah, and one died. That day, the Civil Administration issued eviction orders to seven families from the community of Khirbet Ibzik, numbering 45 people, including 23 minors, for three consecutive days (8, 9 and 10 February 2022). On each day, the families were forced to vacate their homes from 8:00 A.M. until 1:00 A.M. the following day.

On Tuesday, 8 February 2022, at around 8:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military escort to the community and ordered the residents to leave their homes. The next day, the troops came to the area again, at around 9:30 A.M., and ordered the families to evacuate. On the morning of 10 February 2022, the families vacated their homes before the troops arrived. Each time, the families walked six to eight kilometers after the military forbade Palestinian vehicle traffic in the area and stayed at relatives' homes.

During the evacuation days, infantry and tanks trained in the al-Qa’un area north of Bardalah and fired shells. In addition, the troops destroyed dozens of wheat, onion, corn, beans and chickpea fields, as well as irrigation pipes and agricultural dirt roads.

On the morning of Sunday, 13 February 2022, military forces came to the area west of Hamamat al-Malih, about five kilometers away from the community of al-Burj. The soldiers put up tents there and dozens of them trained in the residents’ fields west of al-Burj and fired live ammunition. In addition, tanks trained in pastureland in the area, forcing the shepherds to keep the flocks in livestock pens.

On Tuesday, 15 February 2022, at around 7:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort and a bulldozer to the community of Khirbet al-Fakhit in Masafer Yatta, South Hebron Hills. The forced demolished an agricultural shack belonging to one of the community’s families for the second time.

From there, the forces continued north to the village of Khallet al-Mayah, where they demolished a house under construction intended to house a family of six, including four minors, as well as the family’s cistern.

During the incident, the homeowner came to the scene, and a confrontation ensued between him and the security forces, who knocked him to the ground, and one leaned his knee on his stomach. The forces then tied his hands and feet, grabbed them, picked him up, put him in a jeep and took him to the police station in Kiryat Arba. At the station, he was questioned on suspicion of assaulting members of the security forces and was released that night on a NIS 1,000 bail.

On Tuesday, 8 February 2022, at around 10:30 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort and equipped with a bulldozer to the village of Furush Beit Dajan in the Jordan Valley. The forces demolished a metal-and-concrete rainwater pool funded by the Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture for use by area farmers. The demolition was carried out by virtue of an order issued to one of the farmers on 5 January 2022 by power of Military Order 1797.

Between 25 and 27 January 2022, the Israeli military conducted extensive training in Palestinian farmland in the Jordan Valley. During the training, tanks damaged about 30 dunams of wheat fields in the Khallet Ajmi’ah area, south of the village of al-‘Aqabah. The forces continued training until 27 January 2022.

On Tuesday, 1 February 2022, the troops resumed training, this time near the communities of Khirbet al-Malih, al-Burj and Khirbet Humsah al-Foqa. The troops put up tents and trailers in the area and stayed there until the next day, Wednesday, 22 February 2022. The training included infantry and vehicle training, including four bulldozers.

On Monday, 7 February 2022, dozens of soldiers in military vehicles and tanks arrived at the land of the villages of Um al-Jamal and al-Farisiyah, spread out in cultivated farmland and roamed among the residents’ homes.

That day, at around 10:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military escort to Khirbet Ibzik and delivered orders to seven of the community’s families, numbering 45, including 23 minors, instructing them to vacate from their homes starting tomorrow, Tuesday, 8 February 2022. On each of the days, the families are required to evacuate from 8:00 A.M. until 1:00 A.M. the following day.

On Thursday, 3 February 2022, at around 7:30 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort and bulldozers to the community of al-Hosah, west of the village of Deir Nizam in Ramallah District. The forces demolished two tin-covered structures that housed two families from the same extended family, numbering 10 people in total, including 10 minors. The community is home to 70 residents, including 45 minors, who make a living from shepherding. The community receives electricity, water and other services from Deir Nizam.

On Wednesday, 2 February 2022, at around 9:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort and a bulldozer to Khirbet Khallet a-Dabe’ in Masafer Yatta, South Hebron Hills. The forces demolished four cisterns intended for agricultural use by power of Military Order 1797.
On Tuesday, 1 February 2022, 9:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort, two bulldozers and a digger to the Aqtit area, west of the town of a-Dhahiriyah in the South Hebron Hills. The forces demolished four uninhabited homes, one under construction, by power of Military Order 1797.
In addition, the forces demolished 14 utility poles and cables, one kilometer long, that provided electricity to the homes of five families in the area.

On Sunday, January 30, 2022, at around 8:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel accompanied by soldiers and equipped with a bulldozer arrived at the village of al-'Aqabah in the northern Jordan Valley. The forces demolished a building under construction slated to house a family of ten, including eight minors. The demolition was carried out pursuant to Military Order No. 1797.

The homeowner tried to block the forces using his car, and the soldiers arrested him and confiscated the car.

On Wednesday, 12 January 2021, at around 9:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort and equipped with bulldozers to the Palestinian community of Khirbet al-Fakhit in Masafer Yatta, South Hebron Hills. The forces demolished nine structures, including three housing units inhabited by three families from the same extended family, leaving 18 people, including 11 minors, homeless. The demolition was carried out by the power of demolition orders delivered on 21 February 2016. The other demolished structures, belonging to the same family, included three livestock enclosures, a livestock pen, a kitchen, and fodder storage and a cistern on the family’s land.

Khirbet al-Fakhit is one of the Masafer Yatta communities whose area of residence was declared “Firing Zone 918” by the military in the 1980s as part of Israel’s efforts to expel them. Twenty-two families live in the community, numbering 180 people. Most community structures face immediate risk of demolition after the families have been issued demolition orders. Although the area was declared a "firing zone," community residents tried to obtain permits for their homes retroactively. To that end, they even submitted an outline plan that could have allowed it if approved. These attempts, which were hopeless from the outset, failed after the Civil Administration Planning Committee, the Israeli District Court and the High Court of Justice rejected their requests. In early January, HCJ judges rejected the residents' last petition, and now the Civil Administration has begun enforcing the demolition orders.

In so-called training, the military destroyed hundreds of dunams of crops, tilled fields and farming roads in the area of Khirbet Ibziq. Soldiers fired shells hundreds of meters from community homes, and the Civil Administration again demolished the tents of three families. The official insistence on training in the area, and that in any case it is a “closed firing zone” barred to Palestinians, relies on empty arguments masking the Israeli apartheid regime’s long-term goals: driving the residents out to further control and use area resources. Read more

In the past month, the military has evacuated families from Khirbet Ibzik five times on the pretext that it needs to hold training right by the community’s homes. The last evacuation took place on 27 December 2021, at 8:00 A.M. The military did not allow the families to return to their homes until 2:00 A.M. On the day of the evacuation and the following day, the military conducted training, including with tanks, near the community’s homes and cultivated fields, damaging barley crops. Tanks fired shells 350 meters away from the residents’ homes. At around 9:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel also came to the community. They dismantled and confiscated three residential tents belonging to three families numbering 16 people in total, including six minors. They also confiscated and dismantled eight tents used as livestock enclosures, two tents used for storing fodder, two water tanks and two solar panels. 

On Tuesday, 21 December 2021, at 9:00 A.M., military forces again arrived in the northern Jordan Valley to train near Palestinian communities, following the military training and the evacuations of the families that began on 5 December 2021. The forces trained near Khirbet ‘Atuf, Khirbet Um al-Jamal, Khirbet al-Malih, Kardalah, and the a-Shakh area of al-Farisiya. The soldiers roamed among residents’ homes and near their farmland. Armored forces also trained in the area, firing tank shells near the village of al-Farisiyah. The tanks drove through cultivated fields and damaged dozens of dunams of wheat and barley crops. Troops began leaving the area on Thursday, 23 December 2021.

Residents of the area where the training took place could not go out to graze their flock for fear of being harmed.