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href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israel-fast-tracks-expulsions-palestinian-communities">https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israel-fast-tracks-expulsions-palestinian-communities</a></font>
<h1 id="reader-title">Israel fast-tracks expulsions of
Palestinian communities</h1>
<p class="node__submitted">
<span class="field field-author"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/tamara-nassar">Tamara
Nassar</a></span> <span class="field field-blog">-</span>
<span class="field field-publication-date"><span
class="date-display-single"
content="2018-01-09T17:00:15+00:00">9 January 2018</span></span>
</p>
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<p>Israel forcibly displaced more than 650 Palestinians
in the occupied West Bank in 2017 by demolishing their
homes.</p>
<p>In total, occupation forces destroyed 400 structures
in the West Bank, <a
href="https://www.ochaopt.org/sites/default/files/2017_hrp_draft5_20_12_2017_v2.pdf">according</a>
to UN figures.</p>
<p>More than 100 of the demolished structures had been
funded by international donors. Another 12,500 are
under threat from pending Israeli demolitions orders.</p>
<p>Israel systematically denies Palestinians under
military occupation in the West Bank, including East
Jerusalem, permission to build on their own land.</p>
<p>Much of its destruction has targeted communities in <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/area-c">Area
C</a>, the roughly 60 percent of the West Bank that
remains under full Israeli military control under the
terms of the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/oslo-accords">Oslo
accords</a> signed between Israel and the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/palestine-liberation-organization">Palestine
Liberation Organization</a> in the early 1990s.</p>
<h2>Israel drops legal pretense</h2>
<p>Palestinians are forced to build without permits and
live in constant fear that their homes will be
demolished. Israeli politicians are increasingly
calling for the permanent annexation of Area C, which
would leave the majority of Palestinians in the West
Bank corralled into tiny islands of territory.</p>
<p>Although 2016 <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/charlotte-silver/israeli-home-demolitions-break-records-shatter-lives-2016">marked
a record year</a> for Israel’s demolitions, – almost
1,100 structures were destroyed displacing 1,600
Palestinians – Israel began in 2017 bypassing legal
formalities in order to expedite the expulsion of
Palestinians.</p>
<p>“It seems that Israel is so confident in its ability
to expel entire villages without incurring judicial or
international criticism that it is no longer bothering
to create even the illusion of legal proceedings,” <a
href="https://www.btselem.org/press_releases/20171123_israel_no_longer_bothers_with_legal_proceedings">according</a>
to Israeli human rights group <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/btselem">B’Tselem</a>.</p>
<h2>Fast-track expulsion</h2>
<p>Previously Israel would issue military orders
requiring specific building plans and had protracted
procedures including “precise mapping of the land and
buildings, as well as the issuing of separate
demolition orders for each building,” B’Tselem states.</p>
<p>But in the last year, Israel began relying on a
military order concerning “unauthorized buildings” to
carry out quick expulsions of Palestinians. That order
had originally been intended for the eviction of
settlers from <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/settlement-outposts">settlement
outposts</a> established without Israeli permission,
although it was rarely ever used for that purpose,
according to B’Tselem.</p>
<p>While Israel distinguishes between “unauthorized” and
“authorized” settlements – and often retroactively
converts the former into the latter – all of its
settlements are illegal under international law.</p>
<p>By using this order, Israel targets entire
communities for forced removal without bothering to
issue specific demolition orders for each building.</p>
<p>This order was never previously used on Palestinians.</p>
<p>Now, communities threatened with expulsion by Israel
view this as a continuation of the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/nakba">Nakba</a>
– the ethnic cleansing of more than 750,000
Palestinians by Zionist militias in 1948.</p>
<p>B’Tselem says that it is “virtually unprecedented
since 1967” – the year Israel occupied the West Bank –
for entire communities to be demolished.</p>
<p>In September, the human rights group <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israel-planning-war-crime-against-khan-al-ahmar-families">warned</a>
that Israeli leaders including Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu could be personally liable for war crimes if
they proceed with the planned demolitions of two such
communities, <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/khan-al-ahmar">Khan
al-Ahmar</a> and <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/susiya">Susiya</a>,
to make way for Israeli settlements.</p>
<p>According to the UN, the number of demolitions and
seizures of Palestinian structures in 2017 in Area C
was 265 to the end of November, compared with almost
900 for all of 2016.</p>
<p>“However, obtaining construction permits remains
nearly impossible as a result of a restrictive and
discriminatory planning regime,” according to UN
humanitarian coordination agency OCHA.</p>
<p>Susiya’s 340 residents have been living <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/charlotte-silver/susiya-village-brink-destruction-israel">under
constant threats of expulsion for years</a>,
fighting many legal battles with Israel to remain on
the land they’ve been on since the 1800s.</p>
<h2>Rare intervention</h2>
<p>In November, Israel <a
href="https://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=779525">renewed</a>
its demolition order against the Area C village,
announcing that it could destroy about a fifth of
Susiya’s structures within weeks.</p>
<p>That <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/michael-f-brown/us-senators-cautiously-challenge-ethnic-cleansing-israel">prompted
a rare intervention</a> from 10 US senators who
wrote to Netanyahu urging him “not to demolish the
Palestinian village of Susiya and the Bedouin
community of Khan al-Ahmar.”</p>
<p><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/khan-al-ahmar">Khan
al-Ahmar</a>, also in Area C, lies between the
Israeli settlements of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/maaleh-adumim">Maaleh
Adumim</a> and <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/kfar-adumim">Kfar
Adumim</a> in the so-called <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/e1">E1
area</a> of the West Bank.</p>
<p>The E1 area is targeted by Israel for expansion of
its mega-settlement of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/maaleh-adumim">Maaleh
Adumim</a>, which would complete the encirclement of
Jerusalem and isolate the northern and southern parts
of the West Bank from each other.</p>
<p>Israel <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israel-planning-war-crime-against-khan-al-ahmar-families">issued
evacuation orders to Khan al-Ahmar</a> multiple
times in the past year, prompting strong condemnation
from human rights groups.</p>
<p>Khan al-Ahmar is home to approximately 175 members of
the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/jahalin-bedouin">Jahalin
tribe</a>. Israel is <a
href="http://www.btselem.org/communities_facing_expulsion/khan_al_ahmar">threatening
to destroy its only school</a>.</p>
<p>In addition, Israeli forces harass residents by <a
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcXiV_ZRfJo">confiscating
building materials</a>.</p>
<p>In November, Israel also <a
href="https://www.btselem.org/press_releases/20171123_israel_no_longer_bothers_with_legal_proceedings&sa=D&ust=1515443557884000&usg=AFQjCNFgeE7Us61zigj_jiJ6PeYhTPm11A">ordered</a>
all 300 residents of the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/jabal-al-baba">Jabal
al-Baba</a> community, also in E1, out of their
homes within eight days.</p>
<p>Villagers are refusing to comply and have <a
href="https://972mag.com/palestinians-in-jabal-al-baba-protest-israeli-expulsion-order/130916/">held
protests against their expulsion</a>.</p>
<p>The Jabal al-Baba community was originally in the
southern <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/negev-naqab">Naqab
(Negev)</a> region, before its members were <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.823358">forcibly
displaced</a> to their present location near
Jerusalem.</p>
<p>Khan al-Ahmar and Jabal al-Baba are two of 12
Palestinian communities, with a total of about 1,400
residents in the area east of Jerusalem which face
Israeli expulsion.</p>
<p>Israeli forces also issued expulsion orders to the
communities of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/ein-al-hilweh">Ein
al-Hilweh</a> and <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/umm-jamal">Umm
Jamal</a> in the northern <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/jordan-valley">Jordan
Valley</a> on 9 November, giving residents eight
days to evacuate.</p>
<p>There are over 20 families in the northern Jordan
Valley area who face expulsion.</p>
<p>One reason Israel gets away with these expulsions is
that the international donors that fund the schools
and other facilities Israel is destroying <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/eu-lets-israel-destroy-west-bank-schools-it-funded">have
done nothing to hold it accountable</a>.</p>
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