Israeli confiscates 450 acres of Palestinian-owned farmlands

Israeli confiscates 450 acres of Palestinian-owned farmlands

www.imemc.org

The Israeli Army decided to confiscates 1,700 dunums of land owned by Palestinians farmers for the expansion of a settlement near the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem, Israeli sources reported on Monday.

One acre is equal to four dunums.

According to sources, farmers have filed nine appeals to the Israeli court throughout the past several months; the court dismissed the first eight, but accepted the most recent, and decided to allow the settlers to take over the land to expand the settlement of Efrat.

The Efrat settlement council told the Israeli online daily Haaretz, that the land will be used to construct 2,500 new homes for settlers.

Efrat is the home of 9,000 Israeli settlers, and is part of the Kifar Atzion settlement block, which is the largest illegal settlement bloc in the southern West Bank.

The settlement council of Efrat stated that they will try to get the approval for the new homes from the current government, especially now since outgoing Defense Minister Ehud Barak agreed to build the illegal wall around those lands in order to annex them to the Israeli side of the wall, the council added.

Bethlehem city is completely surrounded from three sides by Israeli settlements. On the fourth side of Bethlehem, there is a massive and sprawling annexation wall.

In 2002, the International Court of Justice in the Hague voted 14 votes to one, determining that Israel's "Separation Barrier" is illegal, according to international law.

The Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 has been repeatedly referenced by the United Nations to infer that any Israeli settlement on occupied Palestinian land, which includes all "Jewish"settlements in the West Bank, as a violation of international law, and the UN has called for the immediate disbandment of all settlements.

Many international scholars, lawyers and peace activists view Israel's expansion of settlements as the biggest impediment to peace and stability in the region.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Are they expanding settlements near the sacred Bethlehem?
Or just showing, basically, they can do what they want?

www.imemc.org
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 18-2-2009 by xbranscombex]

reply to post by xbranscombex


they are showing that they can do what ever they want
and they are also showing that no one can do jack all to stop them when it comes to stealing land,

and people say Hamas is the problem when Israel is also part of the problem.

I thought the two state solution was the Palestinians keeping their land not losing it. What am I missing here? It seems like Israel is swallowing up more and more land. Maybe Im wrong....

This has been the Israeli government practice all along. Not so much news, but at least someone is paying attention.

I wonder if any can even bother to get a 'justification' from the Israeli authorities..., or is no one even allowed to ask.

Hamas isn't even the problem. It's 100% all Israel.

The Israeli Zionists want to create a "GREATER ISRAEL" which is what this map would look like after they've stolen lands around the Middle East.

www.nogw.com...

It's disgusting, but it's what every civilization does.

"Greed brings down even the greatest, most sophisticated, civilizations."

reply to post by bobbylove321


Wow!

That's quite an expansion! Where did this map come from - (not the website - I mean the original source)?

Israel annexing more land...
stop lying..

this seems a guaranteed plan to insure future rocket attacks into these stolen lands. and why the hell would israeli settlers want to move into these newly built settlements?? they would be targeted immediately.

i can tell you that if my neighbor took my farmland (and therefore my livelyhood) by force and the "legal channels" i appeal through ignore my plight i wouldnt take it lightly. Would you??

What else is new ?

We Americans are most likely paying for all of it anyways, just more of our money we DO NOT have wasted elsewhere