West Bank colonisation surge

All over the West Bank, the signs are that there is no longer a feeling among the colonists that they should hide their inexorable spread into stolen land behind legalese or diplomatic pettyfoggery. Residents of Saeer village, south of al-Khalil / Hebron, said on Wednesday 29th that colonists had begun work on 1,500 dunums of lands confiscated for settlement expansion. Heavy equipment was brought to the area and lands bulldozed.

A day earlier, the Palestinian Authority cabinet condemned what it called "Israeli attacks on Palestinians and their property," saying that within the past week, in addition to the land confiscation in the southern West Bank, 40 dunums in Nablus had been appropriated by the Israeli military, and dozens of trees had been taken down as the construction of the "separation" Wall continues in Walajeh.

Also on Wednesday, several homes in the unrecognized Bedouin village of As-Sadir, in Israel's Negev region, were bulldozed to the ground, according to President of the Arab Democratic Party in Israel, Talab As-Sane.

He said the homes belonged to the Al-Freijat family, adding that the continued moves to demolish Bedouin homes in the Negev region was a "crime... wreaking havoc on the land and displacing peoples."

He accused Israel of targeting its Arab population, saying the country's "only aim is to steal the lands."

Earlier in December, 67 members of the extended Abu Eid family were displaced when their six concrete homes were demolished by police in Lyd.

The six buildings were among more than 100 in the city under immediate demolition orders, following an autumn Knesset decision to destroy an estimated 4,000 illegal housing structures in a plan said to cost millions of shekels.

Electronic Intifada reports:

More than 100 Palestinian protesters and their supporters blocked a main street in the city of Lyd on 28 December, demonstrating against the recent demolition of Palestinian homes and what residents say is a rise in racism and police brutality.

Palestinian women from Lyd sit on top of the rubble of their home after it was destroyed by Israel http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article11709.shtml

On 13 December, officials with the Israel Lands Administration (ILA), the government agency that manages and leases state land, entered the Palestinian section of the segregated city flanked by bulldozers and hundreds of municipal, riot squad and border police forces. The bulldozers then demolished seven homes all belonging to the Abu Eid family in Lyd.

The demolition, which took several hours, made homeless 67 members of the entire family, including dozens of children, during one of the worst rainstorms of the season. Dozens of other Palestinian homes have been demolished over the years in Lyd, which is a few miles east of Tel Aviv inside the state of Israel.

Lyd is a so-called "mixed city," as is the neighbouring city of Ramle, with significant Palestinian minority communities living alongside the Jewish majority. Palestinian residents of these communities have been chronically discriminated against and brutalized by police.

Oren Ziv, a photojournalist with Israeli-based photography collective ActiveStills, witnessed the demolitions of the Abu Eid homes and told The Electronic Intifada that the family knew that the ILA had issued demolition orders against their homes, but they were given no notice of exactly when the destruction would take place.

"During the destruction, I climbed onto the roof of a neighbouring house and I saw several bulldozers demolishing the fourth house," Ziv said. "Many neighbours and a few activists were watching it all happen. I've been documenting [home demolitions] for seven years and this was one of the biggest demolitions I've ever seen."

Ziv added that when the bulldozers finished demolishing the seventh house, children were starting to come back from school only to find their homes reduced to rubble.

"People were trying to salvage their papers and belongings from underneath the destroyed homes," he said. "It was hard to find a solution for the family, especially during the terrible weather. They built a protest tent and a tent camp."

Ma'an News Agency reported that the homes were among more than 100 in the city "under immediate demolition orders" following a decision in the Israeli parliament to destroy an estimated 4,000 "illegal" housing structures.

Report: Israel demolishes 55 Jerusalem homes in 2010
Israel's Jerusalem municipality levelled 40 homes and forced 15 Palestinian families to rip down their homes by their own hands in the holy city in 2010, according to the Wadi Ain al-Halwa Information Centre.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k