Israeli Bulldozers Damage Wheat Crops in Negev

Bedouin citizens from the Negev protest in front of the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem against afforestation on their lands, in late January 2022. (EPA)
Bedouin citizens from the Negev protest in front of the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem against afforestation on their lands, in late January 2022. (EPA)
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Israeli Bulldozers Damage Wheat Crops in Negev

Bedouin citizens from the Negev protest in front of the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem against afforestation on their lands, in late January 2022. (EPA)
Bedouin citizens from the Negev protest in front of the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem against afforestation on their lands, in late January 2022. (EPA)

Bulldozers from the Jewish National Fund (JNF) and the Israel Land Authority (ILA) destroyed on Sunday the agricultural farming lands of the Arab citizens in Umm Batin and Tal as-Sabi villages, under the protection of Israeli police and special units.

Witnesses said the police closed the area, prevented the land owners from approaching and destroyed wheat and barley crops. The police claimed the land being planted is state-owned.

In January, bloody clashes erupted between residents of the Negev region and Israeli police after the latter bulldozed their agricultural lands and uprooted olive trees.

Hussein al-Rafay’a, chairman of the Regional Council for Unrecognized Villages, said this process is carried out every year to harm the Arabs of the Negev who stick to their land ownership.

He stressed that the destruction process is part of a plan to end the Arab presence in the Negev.

Israel wants the land to remain barren to be easily looted, he added, viewing the destruction of agricultural crops as an extension of the Israeli authorities’ practices to seize Palestinian lands.

The Negev is a very vast area, located in southern Israel and stretching 12 million dunums.

Dr. Mansour al-Nasasra, a lecturer at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU), said contrary to Israeli claims, there are dozens of historical documents that indicate that the Arabs of the Negev were aware of the importance of land registration.

They demanded that Ottoman authorities and then the British Mandate to officially recognize their ownership of the lands, he added.

Nasasra referred to the citizens’ meeting in this regard with the British Colonial Secretary, Winston Churchill.

The Palestinian academic said many were able to obtain Ottoman and Mandate deeds confirming their ownership of the land. However, Israeli authorities insist that these documents are insufficient.

“We are talking about less than five percent of the land in the Negev,” Nasasra stressed.

He pointed out that the Israeli authorities confiscated 95 percent of these lands in 1948 and now want to confiscate what's left.



Israeli Military: 5 Soldiers Killed in Combat in South Lebanon

Israeli Iron Dome air defense system fires to intercept rockets that were launched from Lebanon, as seen from Haifa, northern Israel, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Israeli Iron Dome air defense system fires to intercept rockets that were launched from Lebanon, as seen from Haifa, northern Israel, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
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Israeli Military: 5 Soldiers Killed in Combat in South Lebanon

Israeli Iron Dome air defense system fires to intercept rockets that were launched from Lebanon, as seen from Haifa, northern Israel, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Israeli Iron Dome air defense system fires to intercept rockets that were launched from Lebanon, as seen from Haifa, northern Israel, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)

Five Israeli soldiers were killed and 16 others wounded in combat in southern Lebanon in recent weeks, the Israeli military said in a statement on Thursday.

Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem said in a speech aired Wednesday that the Lebanese group is open for ceasefire negotiations only once “the enemy stops its aggression.”

His speech marked the 40-day mourning period since former Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah was assassinated in Beirut.

Hezbollah began firing into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, in solidarity with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Since the conflict erupted, more than 3,000 people have been killed and some 13,600 wounded in Lebanon, the Health Ministry reported.