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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element" dir="ltr"> <font
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href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israels-war-its-palestinian-citizens">https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israels-war-its-palestinian-citizens</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">Israel’s war on its Palestinian
citizens</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="2019-02-26T22:50:12+00:00">26 February 2019</span></span>
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<article>
<figure id="file-75131"><source media="(min-width:
72rem)"><figcaption><small><span></span></small></figcaption></figure>
<p>Israel plans to forcibly displace 36,000 Palestinian
Bedouins in the <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/naqab-negev">Naqab
(Negev)</a> region of southern Israel to make way
for a military training area and weapons testing
facility, <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/9677">according</a>
to <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/adalah">Adalah</a>,
a legal advocacy group for Palestinians in Israel.</p>
<p>That’s one quarter of all Palestinian Bedouins living
in the Naqab, all citizens of Israel.</p>
<p>The plan, which was <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/uploads/uploads/The%20Strategic%20Plan%20for%20the%20Regulation%20of%20the%20Negev%20-%2014022019%20-%20FINAL.pdf">announced</a>
late last month, “overtly discriminates against the
Bedouin population, and considers them an obstacle
that must be removed from the landscape in order to
clear a path for Jewish settlement and ‘development,’”
Adalah <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/9677">stated</a>.</p>
<p>Israel’s Authority for the Development and Settlement
of the Bedouins intends to transfer Bedouins to
“poverty-stricken, government-planned townships,”
violating both Israeli and international laws.</p>
<p>If implemented, Israel will sieze about 65,000 acres
of land – an area about one and a half times the size
of Washington, DC.</p>
<p>One of the plan’s projects is to establish the <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/9644">Ramat
Beka</a> military industrial zone.</p>
<p>Israel will move a weapons testing facility owned by
leading Israeli arms maker <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/elbit">Elbit</a>
from the city of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/ramat-hasharon">Ramat
HaSharon</a> in central Israel to the Naqab.</p>
<p>The testing facility, which would be twice the size
of Tel Aviv, poses “health, safety and environmental
risks” to those living around it, and would require
the forcible displacement of thousands of Bedouins and
more than 1,200 of their structures.</p>
<p>Elbit has <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/david-cronin/failed-british-politician-hired-leading-israel-lobbyist">supplied</a>
white phosphorus munitions and drones that have been
used during Israel’s attacks on Gaza. It also <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/eu-funds-firm-supplying-israel-banned-cluster-weapons">manufactures
cluster weapons</a> for the Israeli army, helping it
circumvent an international ban.</p>
<p>As part of the same plan, Israel intends to <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/9686">establish</a>
the Sde Barir phosphate mine, which requires the
forcible transfer of thousands of Palestinian Bedouins
as well.</p>
<p>The mine would cause serious health hazards to
thousands more who remain.</p>
<p>Israel’s National Planning and Building Board and the
Israeli government approved the plan on the basis of
an environmental survey that Adalah says “ignores the
existence of approximately 15,000 Bedouin citizens
living in and around the area designated for
construction of the mine.”</p>
<p>Adalah, along with 168 Bedouin residents of the most
affected village, al-Furaa, and a number of human
rights organizations, filed a <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/uploads/uploads/Al_Fura_phosphate_mine_petition_FINAL_20012019.pdf">petition</a>
with Israel’s high court demanding it stop the
construction of the phosphate project.</p>
<p>A hearing is due on Wednesday.</p>
<p>“In order to Judaize the Naqab (Negev), Israeli
authorities are implementing economic and military
plans that are not intended to serve the Bedouin and,
in fact, ignore their very existence,” Adalah attorney
Myssana Morany stated.</p>
<p>Israel has long sought to get rid of the Palestinian
Bedouin population in the Naqab.</p>
<p>It has <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israel-forces-umm-al-hiran-villagers-agree-expulsion">forced</a>
residents of the Palestinian Bedouin village of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/umm-al-hiran">Umm
al-Hiran</a> to agree to be expelled from their
homes and resettled to the town of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/hura">Hura</a>
in the southern Naqab region under threats of
violence.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Adalah is <a
href="https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/9681">demanding</a>
Israel provide accessible voting stations to 11
unrecognized Bedouin villages whose residents would
otherwise need to travel up to 50 kilometers to vote
in April’s elections.</p>
<h2>Segregated ghetto</h2>
<p>Meanwhile in the north of Israel, hundreds of
Palestinian citizens protested earlier this week
against Israel’s plan to build an Arab-only city on
private land east of Acre.</p>
<p>The new city, called Tantur, would be built on land
Israel seized in the 1970s.</p>
<p>Israel designated approximately 750 acres of
confiscated land – or just over one square mile – for
the project, which is set to include about 15,000
housing units and house more than 70,000 Palestinian
citizens of Israel, <a
href="https://www.arab48.com/%D9%85%D8%AD%D9%84%D9%8A%D8%A7%D8%AA/%D8%AF%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%B3%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D9%88%D8%AA%D9%82%D8%A7%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%B1/2019/01/31/%D8%B7%D9%86%D8%B7%D9%88%D8%B1-%D9%85%D8%B4%D8%B1%D9%88%D8%B9-%D8%A5%D8%B9%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%B1-%D8%A3%D9%85-%D9%85%D8%AE%D8%B7%D8%B7-%D8%BA%D9%8A%D8%AA%D9%88-%D8%AC%D8%AF%D9%8A%D8%AF">according</a>
to the publication <em>Arab48.</em></p>
<p>About 170 acres Israel intends to use are privately
owned.</p>
<p>Several government ministries have adopted the
project, including the interior and housing
ministries.</p>
<p>Palestinians protested in the city of Jadeidi-Makr,
which lies east of Acre and close to the site of the
planned city:</p>
<div id="file-75136">
<div>
<blockquote data-width="550">— شبكة قدس الإخبارية
(@qudsn) <a
href="https://twitter.com/qudsn/status/1099391577162743808?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February
23, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
<div id="file-75141">
<div>
<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="rtl" lang="ar">مسيرة في جديدة المكر
بالداخل المحتل رفضاً لمصادرة أراضي تلة الطنطور.
<a href="https://t.co/aPYZbakAO1">pic.twitter.com/aPYZbakAO1</a></p>
— شبكة قدس الإخبارية (@qudsn) <a
href="https://twitter.com/qudsn/status/1099368750694965251?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February
23, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
<p>Many held protests in Acre as well:</p>
<div id="file-75146">
<div>
<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="rtl" lang="ar">أهالي قرية جديدة المكر
الفلسطينية يتظاهرون ضد مخطط طنطور السلطوي الهادف
إلى إبعادهم عن أراضيهم ومصادرتها. <a
href="https://t.co/mUbB71yi27">pic.twitter.com/mUbB71yi27</a></p>
— التلفزيون العربي (@AlarabyTV) <a
href="https://twitter.com/AlarabyTV/status/1097835692384837632?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February
19, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
<p>Israeli forces attacked protesters, arresting some of
them:</p>
<div id="file-75151">
<div>
<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="rtl" lang="ar"><a
href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/%D9%81%D9%8A%D9%8A%D8%AF%D9%8A%D9%88?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#فييديو</a>
يوثق اعتداء قوات الاحتلال على المشاركين بتظاهرة
جديدة المكر الرافضة لمصادرة أراضي تلة الطنطور
فيها <a href="https://t.co/NG6VnxpVkd">pic.twitter.com/NG6VnxpVkd</a></p>
— 48 الإخبارية (@48nnews) <a
href="https://twitter.com/48nnews/status/1096087022316515329?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February
14, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
<p>Yousef Jabareen, a Palestinian member of Israel’s
parliament for the Joint List, said that the
construction of the new city is part of Israel’s plan
to push Palestinians out of Jewish-majority cities and
put them in ghettoes.</p>
<p>One purpose for the city is “to prevent the migration
of Arabs to existing Jewish cities in the Galilee,
including <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/upper-nazareth">Upper
Nazareth</a>, Karmiel and Tiberias.”</p>
<p>Jabareen added that Upper Nazareth mayor, Ronen Plot,
is an advocate of this project, as he desperately
seeks to limit the migration to the city of
Palestinian citizens of Israel unable to find housing
elsewhere.</p>
<p>Upper Nazareth was founded in the 1950s as part of
Israel’s effort to Judaize the Galilee. As recently as
2012, its then-mayor Shimon Gapso, <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israeli-mayor-expel-palestinian-citizens-hostile-nazareth-gaza-opposing-war">called</a>
for the expulsion of the Palestinian residents of the
neighboring city of Nazareth to Gaza.</p>
<p>Gapso <a
href="https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/shimon-gapso-if-you-think-im-a-racist-so-be-it-1.5318153">proudly
admitted</a> to being a “racist” and, like his
successor, vowed to do whatever was necessary to keep
Upper Nazareth Jewish.</p>
<p>The Israeli government has <a
href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/briefing-paper/palestinians-in-israel-democracy.pdf">long
sought</a> to increase the number of Jewish
residents in the Galilee, where Palestinians remained
a sizeable population after the Nakba, the ethnic
cleansing of Palestinians in 1948.</p>
<p>This has been achieved by building Jewish colonies on
land belonging to Palestinian communities, preventing
the natural growth and the establishment of new
Palestinian towns and villages.</p>
<p>Last year, a town in the Galilee region <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/tamara-nassar/israeli-town-halts-property-sales-after-realizing-most-buyers-were-palestinians">suspended</a>
building tenders for a 2,200-household residential
development after its mayor learned that around half
of the buyers were Palestinian citizens of Israel.</p>
<p>Although the vast majority of its original population
was forced out during the Nakba, Palestinians still
make up a third of the residents of the coastal city
of Acre.</p>
<p>But Jabareen says the construction of Tantur would
“serve the process of emptying” Acre of its
Palestinian population “in a deliberate and systematic
manner.”</p>
<p>Acre, a historic port and <a
href="https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1042">world
heritage city</a>, has long been the target of
Israeli <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/israel-serves-eviction-orders-palestinians-world-heritage-city/13237">efforts
to force out</a> its remaining Palestinian
population.</p>
<p>Israel’s tourism ministry, along with settlement
groups, intend to <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/resisting-cannibalization-palestines-heritage/13254">convert
Acre</a> to a commercial center for Israeli Jews and
tourists.</p>
<h2>Forced to demolish own home</h2>
<p>Meanwhile, a Palestinian citizen was <a
href="http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=782648">forced</a>
by Israeli authorities to demolish his own two-story
commercial building on Saturday in Deir al-Asad in the
Galilee.</p>
<p>Ibrahim Ali Badran carried out the demolition himself
“to avoid the high demolition costs imposed upon him
by Israel if Israel carries out the demolition
instead,” Ma’an News Agency reported.</p>
<p>This video shows the demolition:</p>
<div id="file-75156">
<div>
<blockquote data-width="550">
<p dir="rtl" lang="ar">بدعوى البناء غير المرخص ..
فلسطيني يهدم عمارته بنفسه في دير الأسد بالداخل
الفلسطيني المحتل، اليوم <a
href="https://t.co/wEpeEkfkGl">pic.twitter.com/wEpeEkfkGl</a></p>
— 48 الإخبارية (@48nnews) <a
href="https://twitter.com/48nnews/status/1099199470842138625?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February
23, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
<p>Abdullah Jabarin, a Palestinian from the city of <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/umm-al-fahm">Umm al-Fahm</a>
in northern Israel, was also <a
href="http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=782572">forced
to demolish</a> his own warehouse earlier this month
after a similar order.</p>
<br>
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