Tag: Jordan Valley - Page 11 - International Solidarity Movement

B’Tselem: Report on Israeli expropriation of Palestine’s natural resources

11 May 2011 | B’Tselem

Dispossession and Exploitation: Israel’s Policy in the Jordan Valley & Northern Dead Sea

The dry ‘Ein Uja spring. Photo: Eyal Hareuveni, BTselem, 23 March 2011.

Click here for an interactive version. Download the full report here (pdf).

The Jordan Valley and the northern Dead Sea area contains the largest land reserves in the West Bank. The area covers 1.6 million dunams, which constitute 28.8 percent of the West Bank. Sixty-five thousand Palestinians, live in 29 communities, and an estimated additional 15,000 Palestinians reside in dozens of small Beduin communities. Some 9,400 settlers live in the 37 settlements (including seven outposts) in the area.

Israel has instituted in this area a regime that intensively exploits its resources, to an extent greater than elsewhere in the West Bank, and which demonstrates its intention: de facto annexation of the Jordan Valley and the northern Dead Sea area to the State of Israel.

Israel has used various means to take control of most of the land in the area, as follows:

Thousands of dunams were taken from Palestinian refugees and used to build the first settlements there, beginning in 1968 and extending throughout the 1970s. This, in violation of a military order.
By legal manipulation, Israel has enlarged the inventory of “state land” in the area, such that 53.4 percent of the area, four times greater than pre-1967, is now deemed state land.
Israel has declared 45.7 percent of the area military firing zones, although they are situated next to main traffic arteries, alongside settlements’ built-up areas and farmland, or include land of settlements that is under cultivation.
Israel has closed some 20 percent of the land by declaring them nature reserves, although only a small section of them has been developed and made suitable for visitors. Two-thirds of the nature reserves areas are also areas of military firing zones.
Israel has seized lands in the northern Jordan Valley for the Separation Barrier and has placed 64 landmine fields near the route of the Jordan River. The army itself contends the landmines are no longer required for security purposes.

Using these means, Israel has taken control of 77.5 percent of the land and has prevented Palestinians from building on or using the land or remaining there. Twelve percent of the area has been allocated for settlements, including the entire northern shore of the Dead Sea. Israel’s policy has cut up the Palestinian spatial sphere and isolated Palestinian communities in the area. In the last two years, the Civil Administration has repeatedly demolished structures in the area’s Beduin communities, although some of them were established before 1967.

Taking control of water sources

Israel has taken control of most of the water sources in the area and has earmarked them for the almost exclusive use of the settlers.

Most Israeli water drillings in the West Bank – 28 of the 42 drillings – are located in the Jordan Valley. These drillings provide Israel with some 32 million m3 a year, most of which is allocated to the settlements. The annual allocation of water to the area’s 9,400 settlers from the drillings, the Jordan River, treated waste-water, and artificial water reservoirs is 45 million m3. The water allocated to the settlements has enabled them to develop intensive-farming methods and to work the land year round, with most of the produce being exported. The water allocation to the settlements is almost one-third the quantity of water that is accessible to the 2.5 million Palestinians living in the West Bank.

Israel’s control of the water sources in the area has caused some Palestinian wells drying up and has led to a drop in the quantity of water that can be produced from other wells and from springs. In comparison, in 2008, Palestinians pumped 31 million m3, which is 44 percent less than Palestinians produced in the area prior to the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement of 1995. Due to the water shortage, Palestinians were forced to neglect farmland that had been in cultivation and switch to growing less profitable crops. In the Jericho governorate, the amount of land used for agriculture is the lowest among the Palestinian governorates in the West Bank – 4.7 percent compared to an average of 25 percent in the other governorates.

Israel’s control of most of the land area also prevents equal distribution of water resources to the Palestinian communities in the area; it also prevents the movement of water to Palestinian communities outside the area. Water consumption in Beduin communities is equivalent to the quantity that the UN has set as the minimal quantity needed to survive in humanitarian-disaster areas.

Restrictions on movement

In the framework of the easing of restrictions on movement in the West Bank that was carried out in 2009, Israel did not eliminate the movement restrictions in the Jordan Valley, despite the security calm in the area. Israel still operates four checkpoints in the Jordan Valley – Tayasir, Hamra, Ma’ale Efrayim, and Yitav. At these checkpoints, only Palestinian-owned vehicles that Israel recognizes as belonging to residents of the area are allowed to pass.

The restrictions on movement seriously impair Palestinian life, since most of the educational facilities and medical clinics that are supposed to serve the local residents are situated outside the area.

Restrictions on building

Israel’s planning policy in the Jordan Valley makes it impossible for Palestinians to build and develop their communities. The Civil Administration has prepared plans for only a tiny fraction of the Palestinian communities. Furthermore, these plans are nothing more than demarcation plans, which do not allocate land for new construction and development. For example, the plan for al-Jiftlik, the largest community in Area C (the area that is under complete Israeli control), left 40 percent of the built-up area of the village outside its borders; as a result, the houses of many families are in danger of demolition. The plan for al-Jiftlik is smaller in land area than the plan issued for the Maskiyyot settlement, although al-Jiftlik has 26 times as many residents.

Taking control of tourist sites

Israel has taken control of most of the prominent tourist sites in the area – the northern shore of the Dead Sea, Wadi Qelt, the Qumran caves, the springs of the ‘Ein Fashkha reserve, and the Qasr Alyahud site (where John the Baptist baptized Jesus). Israeli entities administer these sites. Israel also limits tourist access to Jericho, channeling tourists to the southern entrance to the city. As a result, few tourists visiting Jericho city spend the night there, resulting in heavy losses for the tourist industry in the city.

Exploitation of natural resources

Israel enables entrepreneurs in Israel to exploit the area’s resources. The Ahava cosmetics firm, in Kibbutz Mizpe Shalem, produces products from the high-mineral-content mud of the northern Dead Sea. An Israeli quarry next to the settlement Kokhav Hashahar produces building materials. Also, Israel has established facilities in the Jordan Valley for treating waste-water and for burying waste from Israel and from settlements.

International law prohibits the establishment of settlements in occupied territory and exploitation of the resources of occupied territory. B’Tselem calls on Israel to evacuate the settlements, to enable Palestinian access to all the lands that have been closed to them, and to allow them to use the water sources for their purposes. In addition, Israel must remove the restrictions on movement in the area and enable construction and development in the Palestinian communities. Israel must also close down the enterprises that profit from the minerals and other natural resources in the area, and it must also shut down the facilities for disposal of Israeli waste.

Jordan Valley school named after Vittorio

27 April 2011 | Jordan Valley Solidarity

On Monday 25th the first brick was laid for a new school in the Jordan Valley.

Volunteers from the Jordan Valley Solidarity working with Ras Al Auja community members have been making mud bricks for the building during the last two weeks.

On Monday morning, during the much appreciated visit of Luisa Morgantini, the Italian Parliamentarian from the Communist Party, the Jericho Governor and a delegation of more than 50 Italian people, we officially inaugurated the building of the school which has been named “Vittorio Arrigoni” in memoriam of the Italian activist from ISM (International Solidarity Movement), murdered a few days ago in Gaza.

This school in Ras Al Auja will serve to educate more than 200 children who suffer from a lack of this service around. As Ras Al Auja is located in the Area C, building needs Israeli permission, but these permits either take a lot of years or are never given.

After an emotive moment full of hugs among the volunteers, all of them joined the work, adding one or more bricks to the walls of the school while singing the lyrics of traditional Bella Ciao or the Socialist International enforcing the rhythm and the spirit of this struggle for freedom.

Building a school in Area C, the school of “Vittorio”, means a step further in resistance.

Building a new school in the Jordan Valley

Views from the Jordan Valley

19 April 2011 | Jack Curry

The cluster of Jordan Valley villages located around Fasayil offer a twisted microcosm of the fickle barbarity of Israel’s illegal occupation. Families who seemingly share land, live side by side with no separation except the invisible borders enshrined in Israel’s military law. Yet, as you tread amongst the stones between the close lying villages it is clear where the limited rights afforded to Palestinians ends and the increased terror of the occupation begins.

To the south lies Fasayil, which is classified as Area B under the misleadingly named Oslo Peace Accords. Because of the status afforded to it by the 1994 treaty, villagers are entitled to build schools and houses, as well as run water and electricity to their homes. Life is by no means perfect, and the Palestinians who live there are still deeply affected by Israel’s occupation. Yet, being in Area B does afford them a limited right to education and healthcare.

Just under five kilometres to the north is the village of Fasayil al-Fauqa, classified as Area C under Oslo. In 2008, after a project by Jordan Valley Solidarity to build a school, Middle East peace envoy Tony Blair negotiated a special status for Palestinians living there. All solid structures built since the signing of the 1994 Oslo agreement were allowed to stand, despite being ‘illegal’ under Israel’s punishing military law. Yet Fasayil al-Fauqa is still Area C, and these small gains can be cruelly taken away at any time the occupation decides.

Nestled between the two, Fasayal Al Wusta is home to a small community of Bedouin, many of whom travelled to the area from Bethlehem during the late 1980s and 90s following harassment by the army. Fasayal Al Wusta lies in Area C, and it’s inhabitants are thus denied the basic necessities afforded to their neighbours in Area B. This includes water, and electricity from the power lines that criss cross above their homes to Area B and the surrounding agricultural colonies (settlements) of Tomer and El’Fasail.

As a further affront to their human rights, the Bedouin must watch as families a few hundred metres away in Area B receive rice and cooking oil from USAID, and American boxes litter the bumpy road that connects the villages. The only benefit for one family is a cardboard box serving as a makeshift toy box, emblazoned with a ‘gift from the American people’. Now the little these families have is under threat from demolition orders served by the Israeli Occupational Force (IOF).

At any time these men, women and children – some as young as 2 months – could be woken, perhaps at 5am, to the sound of confrontational soldiers barking orders that they leave their home. Then, without even a minutes respite to collect their belongings, they may have to watch as a bulldozer and it’s emotionless driver proceed to destroy what has taken years to build. Over the weekend of 15th-17th April the army came to the village, taking photographs of the condemned tents and their occupants. It is feared the bulldozers will come when the weekend passes.

The demolition orders were served at the beginning of March by a court in Bet El military base, just outside Ramallah. As the Bedouin carry a Jordan Valley identity card they are all but denied the right to defend their homes, as entry into other areas of the West Bank can be a lengthy process. Whilst a lawyer represented the families, he could only gleam a one month stay of execution. That brief period expired on the 9th and 10th of April.

It is difficult for the Bedouin to leave Fasayal Al Wusta because the men have jobs in the area, the majority earning 50 shekels (£10) a day picking fruit and vegetables in the fields of Tomer settlement. The produce, ranging from bananas to aubergines and dates, are then packaged and shipped to Europe, Israel and the Middle East. Whilst grown on Palestinian land, stolen in 1948 and approved by the international community under Oslo, profits are for Israeli’s only.

Now the families fall to sleep at night uncertain of what the next twenty four hours may bring. In a show of strength and resilience, they sit and watch TV amongst belongings that could lie flattened and unrepairable come morning. Maybe the bulldozers will arrive by daylight, maybe they will never come. It is an agonising wait, and an integral element of the psychological war being waged against Palestinians across the West Bank. And on this stretch of land spanning the eastern part of the Occupied Territories the suffering is rapidly intensifying.

In the Israeli state’s drive to ethnically cleanse the fertile land of all Palestinians, the Bedouin of the Jordan Valley suffer constant harassment that extends beyond house demolitions. In February, the Israeli Boarder Police descended upon Fasayal Al Wusta at 1am with megaphones and aggression. They demanded that every man in the village over the age of 15 years had five minutes to make their way to the playground a short walk away in Fasayil. The men were detained for an hour, and it was claimed that the Police chief had a problem with the amount of stones in the road.

A month earlier, two brothers were arrested and taken to Ofar prison near Ramallah again on a spurious charge that the Police chief had taken a dislike to large stones in the street. They were released after two days, but without their identity cards – meaning they couldn’t travel or work. Yet, they had to make the trip back to Fayasal Al Wusta. In order to return home it was essential they avoided Israeli checkpoints, as they would be arrested again. So they took a treacherous trip across mountainous back roads in a private taxi. The cost of the journey was 300 shekels, and each brother had to pay a further 1,000 shekels for a new identity card from the Palestinian Authority. In the three week period it took to receive the cards neither brother was able to earn even a shekel.

These payments are part of a wider economic squeeze on the already poverty stricken Bedouin, which include bail payments for arrested animals and fines if sheep or cattle wander over to the wrong side of a road. It seems the Israeli’s are becoming tired with the capacity of Bedouin families to restart their lives following each demolition. With one tent destroyed, they move a little further across the land and rebuild again. If Israel can bankrupt them, perhaps they will get the Zionist message they are not welcome on their own land. Or, if the international community can get it’s act together, maybe Israel can be told it has to end it’s apartheid laws and hand the Jordan Valley back to the Palestinians.

More demolitions in the Jordan Valley

07 April 2011 | Jordan Valley Solidarity

On April 7th at 6 am the village of Al Aqaba woke up to find the Israeli Army destroying thier road and two homes. Two Caterpillar bulldozers were with the military jeeps. They demolished two concrete houses leaving two families homeless, one with 11 children, and the other with 7 children. Their animal shelters had also been destroyed.

They also destroyed about 2.5km of tarmac road that wound around the hills of the village, and the electricity columns which serve energy to the inhabitants. One of the roads is ironically named Peace Street and is a vital link with the Jordan Valley.The bulldozers also created mounds with the rubble along the road to make it impossible for any vehicle to drive along it.

95% of Al Aqaba, which is in area C, received demolition orders from the Occupation Authority in 2006. Since then they have been mounting a legal challenge, but it is apparent that the occupation army does not wish to wait for their own Israeli `law`.

700 people were forced out of their land in 2006, but the entire village was granted a freeze on their demolition orders until the end of 2011 to give the opportunity to resolve the situation peacefully. Background information about the village is available on their own website.

In the afternoon of 7th April the army also demolished three large animal shelters and a kitchen in the farming community of Al Samra in the northern Jordan Valley. Jordan Valley Solidarity arrived just after the demolitions to find the families devastated, and the grandparents visibly upset.They received demolition orders for the third time on Tuesday 29th March, and were given just three days to destroy their own buildings, making it virtually impossible for them to make an appeal through the courts. When the army did not demolish their buildings straight away they became hopeful that they would be able to get a freeze on the demolition order, but their hopes were destroyed today.

The grandmother was crying at the sight of the destruction, and that the sheep and goats were now out in the afternoon sun without any shade. The animals were all crowding under the tractors and water tanks to try to find their own shade. As well as the animal shelters, the army also destroyed the small kitchen of a family with a young baby, aged just 20 days old.

Army continue to harass Palestinian farmers in the Jordan Valley

31 March 2011 | Jordan Valley Solidarity

Milk poured over the floor of the store room

Yaser and his family (including 8 children) have been living during the spring time in Kherbet Samra, Jordan Valley, since 2006. At 8.30 pm yesterday evening the Israeli army came to his home claiming to be looking for terrorists from Nablus who they said they knew were staying with him. Despite his insistence that only his family were there, they made everyone leave the tents and requested to see the ID papers of all of the family, including his terrified young children.

On the request of the army the family produced their IDs. All the IDs showed that they were related and none of the IDs produced were Nablus IDs. The army refused to say why they believed that people from Nablus were staying with the family. For some time the family were made to stand while the army decided what to do.

The army then claimed that they believed that the family were hiding guns in their tents. They made their way straight to where the children slept and ransacked their tent emptying all the clothes onto the floor. After failing to find any guns they went to the milk store and poured the contents of the milk vessels onto the floor and mixed it with sugar.

The children's bedroom after the army had left

Yaser and his family keep goats. They use their milk to drink, to make cheese for them to eat and then sell what is left in Hebron. The milk from the family’s goats is their only form of income. That morning all of the goats had been milked and their full store (60 litres) was destroyed. At no point did the army show any documents which proved the search was legal as well as speaking in Hebrew the whole time so that the family were unable to understand what was happening. After destroying the families livelihood they left. In total the army remained at the family’s home for one and a half hours whilst the family were made to watch as their home was turned upside down and their way of generating income to support them destroyed. This is just one case of harassment of local Palestinian farmers in the Jordan Valley by the Israeli army. The constant harassment is part of a deliberate policy to make life so difficult for Palestinian families that they leave the valley, whilst at the same time the Israeli state continues to build new settlement homes for Israeli citizens to expand their agricultural development. This colonisation of the valley by Israel is destroying the lives of Palestinians that have lived here for generations.