Israeli occupation authorities have approved the confiscation of 64 dunams of land from the Palestinian village of Um Tuba, south of occupied Jerusalem in the West Bank. This would result in the displacement of 139 Palestinians, mostly children and women, living in approximately 30 Palestinian homes.
The Jerusalem Governorate announced on Wednesday that this move is part of escalating illegal Israeli policies of colonization and land confiscation in Palestinian areas.
It stated that families from Um Tuba filed a petition to the Israeli court to halt the new illegal orders and colonialist activities after it was discovered that about 64 dunams of the village’s land were registered under the name of the “Jewish National Fund.”
According to the governorate, citing lawyer Yazeed Qa’war, who represents the residents alongside lawyer Mohammad Dahleh, the land registration process was carried out without notifying or involving the Palestinian owners of these lands.
Qa’war added that the Israeli authorities relied on the so-called “Israeli Land Settlement Law,” which is increasingly used to confiscate Palestinian lands and transfer them to colonialist organizations.
The governorate pointed out that one resident discovered these measures when applying for a building permit from the Israeli authorities, only to be surprised that his privately-owned land was registered under the “Jewish National Fund,” which promotes the illegal Israeli colonialist activities.
Further investigation revealed similar confiscation actions affecting dozens of dunams of the village’s land.
The Jerusalem Governorate stressed that these steps pose a severe threat to the presence of Palestinians on their land and are part of a policy to forcibly remove the Palestinians to replace them with illegal colonialist settlers.
It called on human rights and international organizations to urgently act to stop these violations, which aim to change the demographic character of occupied East Jerusalem and impose new realities on the ground.
Israeli daily Haaretz reported that 139 Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem fear losing the land they have inhabited for decades, despite having ownership documents, after a decision to register it under the name of a Jewish National Fund.
The land, estimated at 20 dunams, has been inhabited by the residents for decades, and they have built their homes on it.
However, The Palestinians were completely unaware of the registration requirement. They confirmed to Haaretz that no one had informed them about this process.
Since 1967, Israeli authorities have ceased registering land in occupied East Jerusalem. As a result, real estate transactions were never documented, and the authorities do not maintain records detailing the identities of landowners there.
This also led to many residents building their homes on land they own without registering it with the “land authority.”
All of Israel’s colonies in the occupied West Bank, including those in and around occupied East Jerusalem, are illegal under International Law, the Fourth Geneva Convention in addition to various United Nations and Security Council resolutions. They also constitute war crimes under International Law.
Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states: “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” It also prohibits the “individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory”.
