On 24 November Israeli occupation forces demolished two homes, a mosque and a barn, killing livestock, and arrested two young women in the village of Umm Fagarah, in the South Hebron Hills in the occupied West Bank.

The incident was caught on video by Operation Dove, an Italian organization that has maintained a presence in the area since 2004.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILiVe1WPafA

The description of the video states:

At 10 am two bulldozers arrived in the village, escorted by five military vehicles. Without showing any demolition order, the army demolished two houses, a mosque, a barn and a structure containing the generator.

Forced to kneel

During the video, two young Palestinian women can be seen being forced to kneel on the ground by Israeli occupation forces. The heavily-armed soldiers then take the women away in an armored vehicle as observers attempt to question the soldiers. The soldiers respond by demanding to see the observers’ passports and warning other observers to back away.

The description adds that people from neighboring villages rushed to the scene and,

Ignoring the request of the Palestinians to be able to rescue the rabbits, the Israeli army tore down the barn injuring and killing the animals. After the demolitions, the army took away the two girls without providing any explanation on the charges.

The Bedouin village of Umm Fagarah is near the village of al-Tuwani in the area of Hebron, an area where Palestinians, especially schoolchildren, face routine violent attacks by Israeli settlers.

Ethnic cleansing under pretext of lack of “building permits”

As elsewhere in the occupied territories, such as in Beit Hanina north of Jerusalem on the very same day, Israel routinely demolishes Palestinian homes on the pretext that they are built “without permits.” Israel rarely grants such permits to Palestinians to build on their own land. Israel’s home demolitions are crimes under the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Meanwhile, as part of its colonization policy, Israel routinely grants retroactive permission for Jewish-only settlements built on occupied land in violation of international law.

27,000 Bedouins in West Bank a target of Israeli ethnic cleansing

The latest demolitions in Umm Fagarah are part of a longstanding effort by Israel to rid the area of its indigenous population. Earlier this month, Israel destroyed the electricity network in the area, as also documented by Operation Dove.

Umm Fagarah is in “Area C” – most of the West Bank – which under the 1993 Oslo Accords remains under full Israeli military control with no role for the Palestinian Authority. Some 27,000 Palestinian Bedouins in Area C are currently targets of forced removal.

http://electronicintifada.net/blog/ali-abunimah/video-israeli-occupation-forces-demolish-homes-and-mosque-arrest-girls-near-hebron#.TtReXGfCuqA

Beit Ula 14.th October 2011: For the Friday prayer a large number of people gathered by the demolished house and fields of Abdul Jabar Ahtal.
After the prayer the crowd walked about and looked at the damage.

A military jeep appeared on the patrol road connected to the apartheid fence built on Beit Ula land. After some time more jeeps turned up and soldiers appeared in the distance on foot.

The soldiers started to shoot tear gas, and the whole situation escalated. The main part of the crowd withdrew and left in cars and by foot. The soldiers followed all the way back to the cars.

59-year-old Mohammad Ali Abu Safiyya was hit in the chest and is in critical condition in a Hebron hospital. 32-year-old Eyad Bassem Za’qiq was shot in his right thigh. The settler who shot the two men was not arrested.

Israeli Forces arrived on the scene and used sound bombs and tear gas to disperse the gathered crowd as medical teams evacuated the wounded. Several international human rights activists, as well as members of the Palestine Solidarity Project, a Palestinian group which organizes against the occupation in Beit Ommar, were on hand to witness these events.

The attack came hours after Mahmoud Ibrahim Ali Awad was stabbed in the chest by settlers from Ma’on, south of the city of Hebron. His wounds were considered moderate.

The lawyer representing the families, Yasser Al-Jobor, confirmed that the occupation civilian administration had delivered the notices this week. It is not known when the tents will be destroyed and the families currently live in constant uncertainty.

Palestinian Bedouin villagers in Susiya and other communities in the South Hebron Hills face constant harassment from Israeli settlers as well as from the Israeli military. Residences and water wells are periodically demolished and these isolated Palestinian communities are often more vulnerable to settler attacks.

Palestinian organizers with the Palestine Solidarity Project were also present in Om Al-Arrays at the time of the attack to show solidarity with Kamal Nawajeaa, a farmers who owns 1500 dunums of land close to an Israeli settlement. Settlers plant grapes on Kamal’s land in an attempt to annex it. On September 26th, 2010, an Israeli court ordered the settlers to remove the grapes. However at this time, neither the settlers nor the Israeli military has done anything to implement the court’s decision.

AT-TUWANI – The past two weeks have seen a marked rise in settler activity outside the illegal settlements* of Ma’on and the Havat Ma’on (Hill 833) outpost. This has varied from settlers crossing Palestinian grazing land, to grazing their sheep while shooting rocks from slingshots at nearby Palestinian shepherds, to abducting young Palestinian shepherds with the aid of the Israeli military and police.

On Friday afternoon, 19 February, 2010, Israeli settlers, soldiers and
police detained a 12-year-old boy from the Palestinian village of Saadet
Tha’lah, located near the Israeli settlement of Carmel in the South Hebron Hills. The boy had been grazing his family’s flock alone in their regular grazing area, just above Umm Zeitouna Valley, on the south side of the large Israeli dairy facility belonging to the Ma’on Settlement.

When CPTers** arrived, Israeli occupation authorities were also holding
two of the boy’s goats, which especially worried him because one goat was pregnant and could miscarry. Another shepherd from the nearby village of Tuba told the CPTers that he had been in the area and heard the boy’s shouts of panic as the Israelis grabbed him.

The boy reporting seeing two Israeli settlers outside the dairy barns, who summoned and directed the soldiers to go after him. The soldiers walked downhill from the dairy barns, grabbed his two goats, and told him, “If you want your goats back, you better come here.” The boy complied. The other shepherd then reported seeing both a settler and a soldier together grab the boy and physically restrain him. The boy also said he had been struck violently.

Israeli police held the boy and his two goats for about two hours, telling CPT that he had criminally trespassed on Ma’on Settlement land. The boy reported having no idea the land was not open to everyone. The police refused to produce a map defining which land was private, and eventually released him and his goats.

On the same afternoon, about 2 km west, according to area residents, a larger group of settlers crossed the Israeli highway 317 and attacked two shepherds, ages 13 and 21, from Jawayya Village, located about 1km north of At-Tuwani. The settlers killed one ewe and took it away. Although their means were unclear, blood was found at the site. Israeli police arrived and took the boys to their headquarters inside the Qiryat Arba Settlement, near Hebron, in order to file a complaint against the settlers. The boys’ father arrived as the police were leaving, asked if he could speak with his sons, and was told “no.”

CPT and Operation Dove are further investigating the details of both
incidents.

*According to the Geneva Conventions, the International Court of Justice in the Hague, and numerous United Nations resolutions, all Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are illegal. Most settlement outposts are also considered illegal under Israeli law.

At Tuwani – On the morning of Thursday 7 January, 2010, Israeli soldiers attacked and injured Palestinian shepherds from the Musa Raba’i family, as they grazed their sheep in Humra valley, near the village of At-Tuwani in the South Hebron Hills. The soldiers also attacked the internationals accompanying the shepherds and broke a video camera. Before leaving the area the soldiers arrested one of the shepherds, Musab Musa Raba’i.

At around 10:30am Palestinian shepherds were grazing their sheep on privately owned Palestinian land when they saw Israeli settlers observing them from the outpost of Havat Ma’on. A short time later an Israeli army jeep came to the area. After stopping to speak with one of the settlers, three Israeli soldiers approached the shepherds and ordered them to leave the area. The shepherds explained that it was their land, but agreed to move further down into the valley. The soldiers followed them and grabbed at one of the shepherds, so they all tried to quickly leave the area with their sheep. A second army jeep came to the area and a further three soldiers joined in the attack escalating the violence. Soldiers hit the shepherds with their rifle butts, pushed them and while some soldiers forcibly held them to the ground others kicked them.

Other members of the family came to the area, and the women tried to intervene, hoping to deescalate the situation. However, the women were also forcefully pushed to the ground. Internationals trying to video tape the violent attack were roughly pushed and a soldier grabbed at and broke one of the video cameras.

Other villagers came to the area and tried to calm the situation by talking with the soldiers, but the soldiers ignored all pleas for calm and instead fired percussion grenades and tear gas into the small group of women and children gathered nearby on the hillside.

Israeli police reported to the scene after receiving numerous calls from internationals, but arrived as the soldiers were leaving the area. The police told CPTers that there would be a military investigation into the actions of the soldiers.

During the incident a spokeperson from an Israeli Human Right Organization called the local Israeli Army Brigade Operations Room and the Israeli Army Coordination Office to find out what was happening. She told CPT “I called several time and they had no information and no idea that something was going on in At Tuwani.”

Note to Editors: At the time of writing Moussab Mussa Raba’i is still detained at Kiryat Arba police station. One elderly woman, Umm Juma’ Raba’i, and a young woman, Umm Ribhi Raba’i, who is 2 months pregnant, had to be taken to hospital, suffering from the effects of tear gas inhalation. Three of the shepherds, Kamaal Raba’i, Majde Raba’i and Juma’ Raba’i were hospitalized for their injuries, and a young boy, Ramze Jamaal Raba’i, had his tooth broken.

Christian Peacemaker Teams and Operation Dove have maintained an international presence in At-Tuwani since 2004.