Palestinian/Israeli update 01/25/2022..Top Palestinian Authority Official Tipped as Possible Successor to Mahmoud Abbas

Top Palestinian Authority Official Tipped as Possible Successor to Mahmoud Abbas

Israeli police accused of using spyware on civilians

On Wednesday, 12 January 2022, at around 9:00 A.M., Civil Administration personnel came with a military and Border Police escort and equipped with bulldozers to the Palestinian community of Khirbet al-Fakhit in Masafer Yatta, South Hebron Hills. The forces demolished nine structures, including three housing units inhabited by three families from the same extended family, leaving 18 people, including 11 minors, homeless. The demolition was carried out by the power of demolition orders delivered on 21 February 2016. The other demolished structures, belonging to the same family, included three livestock enclosures, a livestock pen, a kitchen, and fodder storage and a cistern in the family’s land.

Khirbet al-Fakhit is one of the Masafer Yatta communities whose area of residence was declared “Firing Zone 918” by the military in the 1980s as part of Israel’s efforts to expel them. Twenty-two families live in the community, numbering 180 people. Most community structures face immediate risk of demolition after the families have been issued demolition orders. Although the area was declared a “firing zone,” community residents tried to obtain permits for their homes retroactively. To that end, they even submitted an outline plan that could have allowed it if approved. These attempts, which were hopeless from the outset, failed after the Civil Administration Planning Committee, the Israeli District Court and the High Court of Justice rejected their requests. In early January, HCJ judges rejected the residents’ last petition, and now the Civil Administration has begun enforcing the demolition orders.

In so-called training, the military destroyed hundreds of dunams of crops, tilled fields and farming roads in the area of Khirbet Ibziq. Soldiers fired shells hundreds of meters from community homes, and the Civil Administration again demolished the tents of three families. The official insistence on training in the area, and that in any case it is a “closed firing zone” barred to Palestinians, relies on empty arguments masking the Israeli apartheid regime’s long-term goals: driving the residents out to further control and use area resources.

Jerusalem area, Dec. 2021: 35 structures, incl. 14 residential units (2 under construction) demolished on Israeli authorities’ orders, leaving 92 people, 42 of them minors, homeless

On Jerusalem Municipality and Civil Administration orders, 35 structures were demolished throughout December in the part of the West Bank annexed to the Jerusalem’s municipal boundaries and in adjacent areas lying within the al-Quds District of the Palestinian Authority.

Ninety-two people, including 42 minors, lost their homes after 14 residential units, including two under construction, were demolished. Twelve of the homes (eight of which were demolished by the owners) had been occupied by a total of 85 people, including 39 minors, who have now been left homeless. Two others were not yet occupied and were slated to house seven individuals, including three minors (one of these homes was demolished by its owners).

The municipality also completed the demolition of a home that was demolished by its owners last month. In addition, 21 non-residential structures, including 18 commercial structures that were a source of income for at least 80 families, were demolished.

Hajjeh Nafeesa is used to frequenting al-Aqsa mosque for prayers everyday and has been doing so for the past fifty years. As it became harder for her to walk, the elderly Palestinian woman bought herself a golf cart, which she also uses to offer free rides to worshippers heading to prayers.