Ramallah, July 9, 2023: The CWRC issued its mid-term report, "Aggressions by the Occupying State and Colonizers on the Palestinian Territories" for the first half of the year 2023. The head of the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission said in a press release issued by his office that the total number of attacks carried out by the The occupation and its colonial militias in the first half of the year 2023 amounted to 4,073 attacks carried out by the various apparatuses of the occupying state, including its colonial militia, on Palestinian citizens and their property. Attacks, followed by Jenin governorate with 553 attacks, then Bethlehem governorate with 435 attacks.
Shaaban indicated that the series of mass attacks carried out by settler militias in the past weeks on the villages of Hawara, Turmus Aya, Umm Safa, Urif, Qaryut, Deir Dibwan and other safe Palestinian villages sounded the alarm about the nature of the next phase of the conflict, a phase for which the Occupation’s official paved the way well first through the arrival of The leaders of the settler gangs came to power in the occupying state, and secondly as a result of the religious schools of terror that brought out this generation of fierce terrorist settlers according to a scenario in which the Palestinians, unarmed civilians, confront the terrorism of the armed settlers, who are protected by the force of the army, which criminalizes the Palestinian attempt to defend himself and his land.
He added that this model, which was created by the occupying and terrorist state, was intended to deal a fatal blow to all attempts by the Palestinians to preserve the remaining land and property and to destroy any possibility of preserving lives as well.
Shaaban added that the attacks carried out by settlers during the period monitored by the report amounted to a total of 1,148 attacks, which caused the death of 8 citizens at the hands of settlers. Organized and dangerous attacks have been characterized in the recent period, such as what happened in Hawara, Turmus Aya, Al-Laban, Urif, Masafer Yatta, and others. These attacks concentrated in Nablus governorate, with 470 attacks, and Ramallah governorate, with 265 attacks.
Shaaban noted that from the beginning of 2023 until the end of June, the occupation authorities studied a total of 75 structural plans for the expansion of settlements or the establishment of new settlements in the West Bank, through which a total of more than 13 thousand housing units were studied for study (8131 units for deposit, and 5191 units for approval).
And in the first half of the year 2023, settlers established 13 colonial outposts on citizens’ lands, most of them pastoral outposts, in the governorates of Ramallah, Nablus, Salfit, Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and Hebron. Shaaban added that the occupation authorities “legalized” 4 new outposts, all of which surround the Eli settlement, which is located between Ramallah and Nablus governorates.
He added that during the period monitored by the report, the occupation authorities confiscated more than 44,000 dunums under various names (amending the boundaries of natural reserves, expropriation orders, seizure orders, and declaring state lands). Of which 43,000 dunums are amending the borders of a nature reserve from the lands of the governorates of Jerusalem and Jericho, and 433 dunums were confiscated through three expropriation orders announced by the occupying state to serve the settlers, and 449 dunums were confiscated through the issuance of 9 seizure orders for security and military purposes, and one declaration confiscated 14 and a half dunums as state land.
Shaaban said that in the first half of the year 2023, the Israeli occupation authorities issued 822 notifications to demolish Palestinian facilities under the pretext of not licensing, in a significant and record increase in the number of notifications sent compared to the same time period last year and the previous year. Most of these notifications were concentrated in the governorates of Hebron (221 notifications) and Bethlehem (170 notifications).
The occupation authorities carried out a total of 256 demolitions, during which they demolished 303 facilities in the West Bank, including the city of Jerusalem, including a basic school in Jubb al-Dhib in Bethlehem Governorate, twice in a row, and 543 people, including 272 children, were affected as a result of the demolitions.
Shaaban pointed out that the occupation state and the settler militia have cut down and damaged a total of 8,340 trees since the beginning of the year, concentrated in the Hebron governorate by cutting down 2005 trees, and the Ramallah governorates 1871 trees, Nablus 1797 trees, in another record recorded against the Palestinian tree in a clear and systematic targeting within the framework of Emptying the Palestinian land.