- The ruling of the shooting range ends with a legal battle dating back to the 1980s
- Israel says the West Bank area is not permanently inhabited
- Palestinian farmers and pastoralists claim historical ties to the land
- Judgment condemned by the United Nations, the European Union
MASAFER YATTA, West Bank, June 12 (Reuters) – Some 1,200 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank region of Masafer Yatta face the risk of being forcibly deported to an army firing range after a decades-long legal battle that ended last month. Israel’s highest court.
The ruling paved the way for one of the largest displacements since Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Middle East war. But residents refuse to leave, hoping its resistance and international pressure prevent Israel from carrying out evictions.
“They want to take this land from us to build settlements,” said Wadha Ayoub Abu Sabha, a resident of al-Fakheit, one of a group of villages where Palestinian pastoralists and farmers claim a historic connection to the land. Read more
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“We’re not leaving,” he said.
In the 1980s, Israel declared the area a closed military zone known as “Firing Zone 918”. The court argued that these 3,000 hectares (7,400 acres) along the border between Israel and the West Bank were “very crucial” to the formation and that the Palestinians living there were only seasonal residents.
“It has been a year of immense pain,” said Abu Sabha, his voice broken as he sat in one of the few standing tents, lit by a single light bulb.
Communities in this part of the hills of South Hebron traditionally lived in underground caves. Over the past two decades, they have also begun building tin huts and small rooms on the floor.
Israeli forces have been tearing down these new constructions for years, Abu Sabha said, but now that they have the backing of the court, the evictions are likely to expand.
A few steps away, his family’s belongings were reduced to a pile of rubble after soldiers arrived with excavators to demolish some of the structures. He lamented the significant losses: declining livestock even more than the destroyed furniture.
Much of the discussion during the long case focused on whether Palestinians living in the area are permanent residents or seasonal occupants.
The Supreme Court concluded that residents “did not prove their claim for permanent housing” before the area was declared a shooting range. It was based on aerial photographs and excerpts from a 1985 book that both sides cited as evidence.
The book, entitled “Life in the Caves of Mount Hebron,” was written by Israeli anthropologist Yaacov Havakook, who spent three years studying the lives of Palestinian farmers and pastoralists at Masafer Yatta.
Havakook declined to comment, but instead referred Reuters to his book. But he said he had tried to present an expert opinion on behalf of the residents following a request from one of his lawyers and that the Israeli Defense Ministry, where he was working at the time, prevented him from doing so.
INTERNATIONAL CRITICISM
The United Nations and the European Union have condemned the ruling and urged Israel to halt demolition and evictions.
“The establishment of a firing range cannot be considered an ‘imperative military reason’ to move the population under occupation,” the EU spokesman said in a statement.
In a transcript of a 1981 ministerial meeting on settlements discovered by Israeli investigators, then-Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon, who later became prime minister, suggested that the Israeli army expand training areas in the hills. of South Hebron to dispossess Palestinian residents of their land.
“We want to offer you more training areas,” Sharon said, given “the expansion of Arab villagers from the hills to the desert.”
The Israeli military told Reuters that the area was declared a firing range for “a variety of relevant operational considerations” and that Palestinians violated the closure order by building without permission over the years.
According to the United Nations, the Israeli authorities reject most of the Palestinian applications for building permits in “Area C”, a strip of land that occupies two-thirds of the West Bank where Israel has full control and where the most Jewish settlements. In other parts of the West Bank, Palestinians exercise limited self-government.
UN data also showed that Israel has marked almost 30% of Area C as military firing zones. The designations have put 38 of the most vulnerable Palestinian communities at greater risk of forced displacement.
Meanwhile, settlements in the area have continued to expand, further restricting the movement of Palestinians and the space available for residents to cultivate and graze their sheep and goats.
“All these olives are mine,” said Mahmoud Ali Najajreh al-Markez, another people at risk, pointing to a grove in the distance. “How can we leave?”
The 3,500 olive trees he planted two years ago – each one counted – were beginning to sprout.
“We will wait for the dust to settle and then rebuild,” Najajreh told Reuters. “We’d rather die than leave here.”
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Report by Henriette Chacar; Editing by James Mackenzie and Mark Heinrich
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