SALFIT, May 16, 2025 (WAFA) – Israeli occupation authorities on Friday unlawfully seized land belonging to Palestinian landowners in the Bruqin town, west of the occupied West Bank city of Salfit, according to a local official.

Mayor of Bruqin, Faed Sabra, said that the occupation authorities handed over an order unlawfully expropriating 13 dunums and 117 square meters of land in al-Fakhakhir and al-Balata areas, and another unlawfully uprooting olive trees from and razing an area of 232 dunums and 503 square meters of land in the same areas.

He added that allowed the landowners only 24 hours to challenge the decision at Israeli military courts, starting from the date of conducting the tour to the land to be unlawfully expropriated.

He pointed out that Bruqin has been the target of ongoing Israeli assaults since Wednesday evening, as the occupation forces completely sealed off the town’s four entrances, conducted house-to-house raids, assaulted occupants, and threatened to bring in bulldozers and tanks to destroy all the houses.

This came in the wake of a shooting attack on Wednesday that killed one settler and seriously wounded another near Salfit.

In response to the shooting, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called for the destruction of the Palestinian villages of Bruqin and Kafr ad-Dik, located near Salfit in the northern West Bank.

The far-right minister wrote on the X platform: "Just as we destroyed Rafah, Khan Yunis, and Gaza, we must destroy the terrorist nests in Judea and Samaria," using the Jewish term for the West Bank.

"Bruqin and Kafr ad-Dik should look like Shuja'iyya and Tel al-Sultan," he added.

K.F.