Press Release: Veritas Press C.I.C.
Author: Kamran Faqir
Article Date Published: 11 Aug 2025 at 17:36 GMT
Category: Middle East | Palestine-Gaza | US-Israel At War
Source(s): Veritas Press C.I.C. | Multi News Agencies
RAMALLAH, Occupied West Bank – Israeli settlers, backed by heavily armed occupation forces, have established a new settlement outpost on Palestinian land in the town of Atara, north of Ramallah, in what rights groups describe as a flagrant breach of international law and an escalation in Israel’s campaign to seize and colonise occupied territory.
According to the Al-Baydar Organisation for the Defence of Bedouin Rights, settlers arrived on Monday with bulldozers to level land in the Jabal al-Khirba area, an archaeological zone spanning about 2,000 dunams, before installing mobile homes under military protection. Israeli forces prevented landowners and villagers from approaching the site, Al Jazeera Arabic reported.
Al-Baydar condemned the move as part of a “systematic colonial policy” to expel indigenous Palestinians and expand Jewish-only settlements.
“This is a clear breach of Palestinian rights, international law, and UN resolutions,” the organisation said, urging immediate international intervention to halt the project and hold those responsible accountable.
Coordinated Land Seizures And Attacks:
The Atara outpost is just one flashpoint in a widening pattern of settler violence and state-backed land appropriation across the West Bank.
On Monday, settlers uprooted dozens of olive, pomegranate, citrus, and grape trees in Deir Sharaf, west of Nablus, belonging to farmer Mohammed Abdel Rahim Nofal, according to WAFA news agency. They also destroyed irrigation pipes, which are vital for local agriculture.
The Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission reported that in July alone, settlers carried out 232 acts of vandalism and theft, damaging vast tracts of Palestinian farmland and destroying 2,844 trees, including 2,647 olive trees, a backbone of the rural economy.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces began bulldozing lands in Burqa village, northwest of Nablus, uprooting ancient olive trees in the al-Wadi area near the Jenin–Nablus road. Residents say the works are part of road expansion projects that primarily serve settlements.
Jordan Valley: Displacement Under Pressure:
In the northern Jordan Valley, settlers forced Palestinian shepherds to leave their grazing lands in Al-Hamma on Monday, continuing a months-long campaign of intimidation that includes assaults, livestock theft, tent raids, and blocking access to water sources.
Since summer 2024, more than 25 Palestinian families have been driven from their homes in the area, with three entire communities erased. According to an August report by the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission, 33 Bedouin communities have been displaced since October 7, 2023.
Defying The ICJ Ruling:
The latest outpost construction comes despite a 2024 International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling declaring Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory unlawful and calling for an immediate end to settlement activity. The ICJ reaffirmed that all settlements in occupied territory violate international law, a position backed by the UN and the overwhelming majority of states.
Instead, settlement expansion is accelerating. The Israeli government is preparing to advance the controversial E1 project east of occupied East Jerusalem, which would link the illegal Ma’ale Adumim settlement with Jerusalem, bisect the West Bank, and isolate Palestinian communities. Rights groups warn that the plan would fragment Palestinian territory into disconnected enclaves, making a two-state solution unviable.
Germany reiterated its opposition on Monday, with Foreign Ministry spokesperson Kathrin Deschauer stating: “We strongly reject the E1 settlement project. What we are concerned about is that a two-state solution remains possible in the long term.”
Escalating Crackdown: Arrests, Demolitions, And Violence.
Alongside settlement expansion, Israeli forces have intensified raids across the West Bank. According to the Palestinian Authority’s Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs, at least 30 Palestinians were arrested overnight on Monday in Hebron, Nablus, Bethlehem, Ramallah, and Tulkarem, including two women, a female journalist, and several former prisoners.
Since October 2023, more than 20,000 Palestinians have been arrested in the West Bank.
Forced displacement is also rising. In Bethlehem, residents of Beit Iskaria village were served eviction orders this week, giving them just ten days to vacate farmland covered with grapevines. Demolitions have surged, with rights groups documenting 75 demolitions in July targeting 122 structures, including 60 homes and numerous agricultural and livelihood facilities.
Settler attacks have reached unprecedented levels. Armed settlers, often receiving military support, have stormed Palestinian villages, set fire to crops, vandalised homes, and physically assaulted residents, leading to several deaths. UN officials warn this constitutes a coordinated campaign to forcibly remove Palestinians from strategic areas.
Targeting Religious Leaders:
Israeli authorities have also escalated restrictions on Palestinian religious leaders. On Monday, they issued a six-month ban on Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, the grand mufti of Jerusalem, from entering Al-Aqsa Mosque. The order came after his Friday sermon condemning Israel’s starvation policy in Gaza.
A Systematic Drive To Erase Palestine:
What is unfolding in Atara is not an isolated land grab but part of a meticulously coordinated strategy, executed by armed settlers and sanctioned by the state, to fragment the West Bank into disconnected, nonviable enclaves. The bulldozers, mobile homes, uprooted olive trees, and armed roadblocks are not simply the byproducts of “security” measures; they are the instruments of an irreversible demographic and geographic transformation.
The 2024 International Court of Justice ruling has been rendered meaningless on the ground, reduced to a footnote in the face of military-backed colonisation. Each new outpost and every destroyed grove further entrenches an apartheid system that international law explicitly forbids. By allowing these violations to proceed without consequence, the international community has effectively signalled that Israel can continue to defy global legal orders with impunity.
Germany’s statements, the UN’s resolutions, and the European Union’s formal objections carry no weight when no state is willing to leverage real political, economic, or legal pressure. In practice, the lack of enforcement turns these condemnations into little more than diplomatic theatre, words that do nothing to protect the shepherd in Al-Hamma, the farmer in Deir Sharaf, or the families of Atara watching their ancestral land disappear behind barbed wire.
As settlements expand and arrests increase, the Netanyahu government’s message is clear: the map will be forcibly redrawn before any Palestinian state is recognised. If the pattern of the past ten months continues, the West Bank will not merely be occupied; it will be permanently divided, its communities emptied, and its history rewritten.
For Palestinians, this is not just the theft of land. It is the erasure of a homeland in plain sight, carried out under the watch of a world that has chosen, time and again, to look away in cowardice…
Tags:
Leave a Reply