Israeli court approves eviction of eight Palestinian villages

On Thursday, Israeli forces attacked the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem, leaving 16 Palestinians injured and dozens arrested, Al Jazeera reported.

According to the Sama al-Quds medical center, injured Palestinians got 14 fractures due to rubber bullets and tear gas suffocation. The Red Crescent reported that two people received injuries as they got beaten and rushed to the hospital for urgent medical aid.

Israeli court approves eviction of eight Palestinian villages

Almost fifty (50) Palestinians, including both elderly and kids, were taken into arrest and steered out of the compound from Bab al-Silsila, also called Chain Gate. Reports suggested that approximately 600 settlers stormed the compound from the Moroccan Gate on Thursday morning, and more were feared to raid during the afternoon. Amid police security, settler invasion into the Al-Aqsa Mosque Compound continued after remaining on halt for ten days during the last days of Ramadan. Even in those days, there was a complex, tense situation.

Hamas issues a statement on Thursday saying, « settler incursions are a serious escalation and direct provocation, threatening a comprehensive explosion, for which the occupation government bears full responsibility. »

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, in April alone, 23 Palestinians, including three children and two women, were fatally shot and killed by the Israeli occupation forces.

While Israel is all set to celebrate its Independence Day according to the Jewish calendar, on May 15, the people of Palestine will mark Nakba day. Around 750,000 Palestinians had to face forced displacement from Palestine on that day.

The sacred site has been a hub of continuous violence and intense chaos followed by multiple attacks inside Israel. Reports of raids in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank have also become daily news.

In 2021, rising tensions due to the forced eviction of Palestinian families in Jerusalem increased prevalent Palestinian protests around Israel and occupied Palestine. Tensions further escalated as Israeli forces conducted raids of the Al-Aqsa Mosque during the blessed month of Ramadan. Furthermore, a couple of days later, Israel began an extensive assault on Gaza, apparently attacking Hamas properties.

Noura Erakat, Human Rights attorney, Associate Professor Rutgers University, and  author, said in a tweet:

« I spent the better part of last week defending myself, my students, & my comrades against vapid accusations of antisemitism, including from law professors who should know much, much better. Meanwhile, Israel’s highest court just endorsed the ethnic cleansing of Massafer Yatta. This is the direct result of conflating anti-Zionism, THE analytical anchor of Palestinian freedom, with antisemitism. It means we get punished for causing harm as Israeli state violence pummels our bodies physically & metaphorically. We are framed as aggressors as we are attacked. »

Last week, Canadian MP Leah Taylor Roy condemned offensive attacks on Muslims worldwide during Ramadan, including Israel’s attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Apartheid is a less effective term to explain what’s happening in occupied Palestine. Ethnic cleansing, Holocaust & genocide could be more appropriate terms for the atrocities committed by the self-declared Jewish entity.

Israeli high court issued an order to displace more than 1000 Palestinians from the West Bank after a legal battle that lasted for two decades. The Israeli military had occupied the land during one of the most crucial eviction decisions ever since Israeli forces started occupying the Palestinian facilities in 1967.

According to the Geneva Convention, grabbing occupied land for matters not beneficial for the residents or transferring local people with force is illegal. However, Israel insisted that the villagers living nearby Firing Zone 918 at Masafer Yatta not being permanent residents at the time of the firing zone declaration. Hence, they did not exercise rights on the land.

Mohammed El-Kurd, Palestine correspondent for The Nation, writes mainly about dispossession in Jerusalem and colonization in Palestine; he authored an article in which he said:

« The Israeli regime’s architecture of displacement uses many different methods, but all have a single goal: to control as much land as possible while keeping as few Palestinians possible without triggering international alarm bells—be it through manufacturing « real-estate disputes »; demolishing homes built « without authorization »; stealing lands by declaring them to be « military zones, » « archeologic sites, » « environmentally protected, » or « state-owned »; or simply by stunting the growth of Palestinian communities by isolating them and severing their social and economic ties with neighboring towns. The Zionist project has always created narratives to legalize and justify replacing the native with the settler. »

Since the 1970s, almost eighteen percent of the occupied West Bank has become firing zones for Israeli military training. Ariel Sharon, former agriculture minister and then prime minister, advised making Firing Zone 918 to displace local Palestinians from their residences, followed by a 1981 ministerial meeting. Israeli forces have been threatening the people of Palestine, dwelling nearby firing zones with house destructions and grabbing agricultural land since they don’t have building permits authorized by Israeli officials.

After a long silence, an Israeli NGO said: « The high court has just green-lighted the largest population transfer in the history of the occupation since the early 1970s.

« Deportation of over 1,000 people in favor of expanding settlements, outposts, and training of Israel Defence Forces soldiers is not only a humanitarian catastrophe that could set a precedent for other communities across the West Bank but also a clear step in de facto annexation of the occupied Palestinian territories and cementing military rule indefinitely. »

Basel Adra, a Palestinian journalist and activist fighting for his community, Massafer Yatta, from forced eviction, shared some distressing pictures in a tweet and said:

« The occupation court just decided: My community will be destroyed. I live in Massafer Yatta, Palestine. An unjust 23-year-long trial ended today with a verdict of a mass eviction. The army can now place us on trucks, 2,400 people, and expel us from our ancient villages, one by one. »

Firing Zone 918

Retweeting Adra’s tweet, Mohammed El-Kurd wrote a detailed thread in his latest post:

« At the Israeli High Court of « Justice, » a settler judge living in an illegal settlement in Hebron has ruled to ethnically cleanse thousands of Palestinians from the lands they have owned and cultivated for 13 generations in Masafer Yatta, Hebron. I can’t make this up. In the 80s, the Israeli regime designated the 22 villages of Masafer Yatta as « Firing Zone 918″—decades after Palestinians built them—declaring them off-limits to anyone but the Israeli military (This doesn’t apply to Jews, whether Israeli citizens or not). »

He continued, « A recently uncovered 40-yr-old official document from the « Israel State Archive » confirmed that the regime declared military zones in Masafer Yatta solely to expel the natives. This discovery isn’t shocking to Palestinians, however, as we concluded this decades ago. Declaring Palestinian lands to be putative military zones is a standard method of land-grabbing. Today 18% of the lands in the West Bank are considered « firing zones. »

« But Israeli media is, of course, reporting on this as though Palestinians are intruding in their lands. The people of Masafer Yatta—who predate « military zones » AND the Zionist state itself—are in extreme danger. If the Israeli regime goes forth with the expulsion, it would be one of the largest since 1967, when hundreds of Syrian & Palestinian villages were ethnically cleansed, » El-Kurd added.

« This is horrific, this is illegal, and this is being funded by us, by U.S. taxpayers. Don’t look away, » said Mehdi Hasan, Host at mehdihasanshow on MSNBC.

Although the United States and Western countries have tried for many years to bring a two-state solution for the Israel-Palestine issue but all in vain. The main idea to declare Palestine a sovereign state alongside Israel has been a crucial part of the peace talks between Israel and Palestine. As peacemakers hope to succeed in this agreement, Palestinians have been chanting religiously for a one-state solution.

This popularity is evident from the latest survey conducted by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research (PSR); in which 33% of Palestinians residing in the occupied West Bank and Gaza voted in favor of a one-state solution. Most of the supporters of a one-state solution are young, nationalist, and secular Palestinians but this demand has gained popularity in a short time. 

This constant demand for a one-state solution could be due to Israel’s illegal settlement formation in the occupied West Bank. Many Palestinians believe that it is no longer possible to witness the creation of a separate Palestinian state through peace talks as Israeli forces have been constantly invading Palestinian land.

Masafer Yatta

From what the people of Masafer Yatta people and Israeli rights groups claim, several Palestinian communities have been permanent residents in the 7,400 acres of land since before Israel overtook West Bank in the 1967 Middle East War ousting would be an international law violation.

« Court is part of the occupation »

« This proves that this court is part of the occupation, » stated Nidal Abu Younis, Masafer Yatta Mayor. « We are not going to leave our homes. We will stay here, » he continued.

The court declared that villagers could agree with the military on utilizing portions of the land for agriculture and insisted both sides agree on a common point.

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), including Masafer Yatta locals, filed a petition against the eviction and warned about “unprecedented consequences.” of the verdict.

“The High Court has officially authorized leaving entire families, with their children and elderly, without a roof over their heads,” according to ACRI.

Despite all the hardships and atrocities, Palestinian worshipers performed Isha prayer near Al-Aqsa Mosque about the shut down of its gates by Israeli occupation forces after shooting a young Palestinian man on May 8.

8th May Updates:

• Israeli occupation forces reopened Al-Aqsa Mosque’s Gates.
• Israeli occupation forces brutally assaulted young Palestinian men and children in the Bab Al-Amoud area, occupied Jerusalem.
• Nazir Marzouk, 19, was a young Palestinian man who got shot by Israeli occupation forces in the Bab Al-Amoud area in occupied Jerusalem. He was transferred to Hadassa Ain Karem Hospital, according to Lawyer Khaldoun Najm.
• Part of Israeli settlers stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque under the protection of Israeli forces.
• Local sources told that Israeli occupation forces arrested the released prisoner Adnan Jaber Shamasneh after storming his house at dawn in Qatana town, northwest of Jerusalem.
• Israeli occupation forces arrested several school students in the Bab Al-Amoud area of occupied Jerusalem.
• Under the protection of the occupation, Israeli settlers continue storming Al-Aqsa Mosque in the early hours of the morning.

On May 9, Israeli forces raided Atuwani, #MasaferYatta in an attempt to destroy a sheep barn under construction. The soldiers attacked and injured at least two activists; one was severely injured and taken to the hospital.

Palestinian Khaled Zayton, who got his nose broken and his skull fractured after being fired with IOF’s rubber bullet last Friday of Ramadan, was notified of a demolition order by Israeli occupation authorities.