JERICHO, March 21, 2025 (WAFA) – Israeli colonists Friday evening stormed al-Auja community, located to the north of the occupied West Bank city of Jericho, according to a local activist.
Hassan Malihat, the general supervisor of the Al-Baydar Organization for the Defense of Bedouin Rights, said that colonists, under army protection, barged their way into the community and grazed their cattle between civilians’ dwellings.
He slammed this encroachment as a part of a scheme of tightening restrictions on Palestinian Bedouin communities in the Jordan Valley to displace them and take over their land.
The Jordan Valley, a fertile strip of land running west along the Jordan River, is home to about 65,000 Palestinians and makes up approximately 30% of the West Bank.
Since 1967, when the Israeli army occupied the West Bank, Israel has transferred at least 11,000 of its Jewish citizens to the Jordan Valley. Some of the colonies in which they live were built almost entirely on private Palestinian land.
The Israel occupation military has also designated about 46 percent of the Jordan Valley as a closed military zone since the beginning of the occupation in June 1967, and has been utilizing the pretext of military drills to forcefully displace Palestinian families living there as part of a policy of ethnic cleansing and stifling Palestinian development in the area.
Approximately 6,200 Palestinians live in 38 communities in places earmarked for military use and have had to obtain permission from the Israeli authorities to enter and live in their communities.
In violation of international law, the Israeli military not only temporarily displaces the communities regularly, but also confiscates their farmlands, and demolishes their homes and infrastructure from time to time.
Besides undergoing temporary displacement, the Palestinian families living there face a myriad of restrictions on access to resources and services. Meanwhile, Israel exploits the resources of the area and generates profit by allocating generous tracts of land and water resources for the benefit of the colonists.
Israeli politicians have made it clear on several occasions that the highly strategic Jordan Valley would remain under their control in any eventuality.
K.F.
