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The Israeli army demolished a school in Masafer Yatta. Residents say it won’t be the last.

Following the demolition, an Israeli army spokesperson claimed that the school itself was a hoax, and that it was an unoccupied building being used as a publicity stunt.

Israeli forces demolished a Palestinian primary school in the Masafer Yatta area of the southern occupied West Bank on Wednesday, under the pretext that the school was built “illegally” in an active Israeli military firing zone. 

Israeli forces raided the Palestinian village of Isfey al-Fauqa in Masafer Yatta, known also as the South Hebron Hills, early Wednesday morning during active school hours, as a number of students were inside the recently-constructed school receiving lessons. 

According to locals, Israeli forces evacuated the students and teachers before demolishing the structure, made of prefabricated buildings. Videos taken at the scene were widely circulated on social media, showing a number of distressed school children crying as the armed forces prepared the school for demolition. 

Other photos showed school children retrieving their textbooks and papers that were strewn across the ground following the demolition. 

The school was constructed by the Palestinian Authority as part of its Tahadi” program, meaning “challenge” in Arabic, to build educational institutions in marginalized Palestinian communities across Area C, the more than 60% of the West Bank under full Israeli control where Palestinian construction is banned. 

Beginning in 2016, the program, which has been funded in large part by the European Union, has seen the construction of over a dozen schools in Area C, including the one in Isfey al-Fauqa, which was constructed around two months ago. 

The school had been in service only for a couple of weeks prior to its demolition, and was servicing approximately 23 students from Isfay al-Fauqa and the surrounding villages. 

Just one day prior to the demolition, a number of diplomats and UN representatives had visited the school and posed for pictures in front of the new buildings. Following the demolition on Wednesday, the PA, the EU, and UN representatives criticized Israel for the move, saying that the Israeli government has a responsibility to ensure that children living in the occupied territory have access to a safe education. 

Israeli military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Richard Hecht claimed that the “full picture on the ground” was “very different” from the one presented on social media and in the press. Hecht said on Twitter that the Palestinians in Masafer Yatta were being “cynically & dangerously used as pawns to populate illegal structures.”

“The [international] community’s support for these structures, [including] schools empty in the middle of the day, only creates further difficulty for all,” he said. 

But the Palestinians in Masafer Yatta say the school was built to address a real need in the rural community, where another four schools, many of them several years old, are also under imminent threat of Israeli demolition. 

“The purpose behind building the school in that location was to allow the kids from the Isfay area to have access to a school nearby, and not have to travel far distances in order to get to the existing schools across the Firing Zone,” local activist Sami Huraini told Mondoweiss

“What’s happening in Masafer Yatta is a war crime, and it will happen to the rest of the schools in Firing Zone 918,” Huraini said. 

In May 2022 the Israeli High Court made its final decision in a 20-year legal battle by the people of Masafer Yatta, ruling in favor of the army, which declared thousands of acres of land in the area as an active military “firing zone.”

The court’s decision in May paved the way for the forcible displacement of an estimated 1,300 Palestinians in Masafer Yatta, and the demolition of close to 900 structures, including homes, livestock pens, schools, clinics, mosques, water cisterns, and latrines. Rights groups have condemned the decision as a court-sanctioned war crime. 

In late August, the court rejected an appeal against the demolition of two schools in the villages of Khirbet al-Fakheet and Jinba, which lie in the heart of the firing zone. 

Since the high court’s decision, Palestinians in Masafer Yatta have stepped up their global campaign to #SaveMasaferYatta, calling for immediate intervention to prevent the expulsion of the residents by the Israeli army. 

Huraini called the international community “hypocritical” for failing to take a stronger stance on the situation in Masafer Yatta, saying “it shows how scared and weak the international community is in front of Israel.”

“Our children should not have to travel such far distances in harsh conditions to get to school, while facing daily harassment from the settlers. These children should be able to go to school safely and freely, and have the right to an education, like all the other kids in the world.”

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They only did half the job. They forgot to burn the books.

They are a cruel nation, and are always looking for vicious ways to kick these poor people. They are extremely sadistic, and want these poor people to suffer in every way possible, and they will do anything they can to make sure they make them suffer. The zionists bomb schools, hospitals, power stations, shelters, and seem to get some (sick) pleasure watching the Palestinians do without basic necessities. They demolish homes and schools saying it was built illegally, which is ridiculous, considering it is THEY who are notorious for building homes in ILLEGAL SETTLEMENTS, and have earned world condemnation for breaking international laws, including stealing lands.

It is sickening to see the zionists behave so arrogantly, and show no mercy nor compassion, for the Palestinian people, that the rest of the world including the US, has ignored. If it was up to them the Palestinians will be uneducated, starving, have no access to clean water, have no electricity, have no farms, living among the rubble, and basically be living in the stone age….it is already getting there.

“Israeli forces demolished a Palestinian primary school in the Masafer Yatta area of the southern occupied West Bank on Wednesday, under the pretext that the school was built “illegally” in an active Israeli military firing zone.”

J Street has got this one right –

https://jstreet.org/israeli-firing-zones-and-displacement-of-palestinians-in-the-west-bank/#.Y4T4JzPMJkg

Firing zones are closed areas in the occupied West Bank that Israel has designated for military training by the Israel Defense Forces. Israel has designated a substantial portion of the West Bank – roughly 18 percent – as firing zones. Despite claims of military need, only 20 percent of land classified as a firing zone is actively used for military training….According to new archival evidence from a “top secret” meeting, the firing zones were designated to reserve land for Israeli settlements. The zones were the brainchild of Ariel Sharon who, while Agriculture Minister in 1979, told a joint meeting of the Israeli government and the World Zionist Organization, “As the person who initiated the military fire zones in 1967, they were all intended for one purpose: to provide an opportunity for Jewish settlement in the area.” As intended, land has been transferred to settlements (which are illegal under international law) from the firing zones.

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“Israel” continues its theft of Palestinian lands:
Israel plans 60-mile concrete wall in northern West Bank – Al-Monitor: Independent, trusted coverage of the Middle East
”Israel plans 60-mile concrete wall in northern West Bank” Al Monitor, by Ahmad Melhem, Nov. 28/22″Palestinians believe that Israel’s decision to build a concrete separation wall in the northern West Bank aims to entrench its control over their lands & draw new borders.
RAMALLAH, West Bank — “Palestinians are concerned about Israel’s recent decision to replace the northern West Bank security barrier with a concrete fence, which they believe will entrench Israel’s takeover of the lands around the barrier. 
“On Nov. 14, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz approved the construction of the concrete wall in the northern West Bank, in lieu of the barbed wire fence erected 20 years ago. Construction is expected to begin in coming months. The new wall will be equipped with advanced technological surveillance. “According to Israeli media reports, the new structure will replace a 50-kilometer stretch of fencing near the settlement of Avnei Hefetz. This part will be added to another 50-kilometer stretch of fencing from the town of Salem, which will also be replaced with a concrete wall. Work on this project had already begun in June. 
“The two projects, according to Israeli officials, aim to close the ‘holes and gaps‘ in the barbed fencing, in an attempt to thwart any infiltration from the West Bank into the Green Line in the wake of recent armed operations inside the Green Line.
“The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a July 2013 report that 85% of the security barrier is located within the West Bank & not along the Green Line (the 1967 borders). In 2004, the International Court of Justice declared the security barrier illegal.
Suhail Khalilia, head of the settlement monitoring unit at the Applied Research Institute – Jerusalem, told Al-Monitor that the real aim of the wall is to draw new borders for the West Bank. The wall seized about 12.5% of the West Bank lands that are currently located between the separation wall & the Green Line, he explained. (cont’d)

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“Khalilia added that Israel has already started to convert sections of the barbed wire into concrete to entrench the barrier as a permanent border for the West Bank, similarly to the wall on the border with Lebanon. The lands that Israel is seeking to control behind the wall, he said, are agricultural lands and forested areas containing natural water sources.
“The planned wall stretches over 771 km long, of which Israel has completed about 500 km. Work is underway to replace other sections of the barbed fence wire, while construction on the remaining track is still pending an official decision in some areas of Jerusalem and Bethlehem, Khalilia added. 
“Khalilia further noted that Israel used barbed wire fence in agricultural and open areas, and cement along Palestinian villages and cities.
Ayed Marar, the director-general of the legal department at the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, told Al-Monitor that Israel decided to replace the fencing with concrete under the pretext of warding off commando operations inside the Green Line. But, he said, the wall actually aims at controlling the land and annexing large parts of the West Bank.”