Israeli occupation forces abducted a Palestinian man on Thursday, while illegal paramilitary Israeli colonizers destroyed agricultural fields and fruit orchards in several areas of the Hebron governorate, in the southern occupied West Bank.
In the city of Hebron, the army invaded the Jabal Abu Rumman neighborhood and abducted Nabih Nabil Sharabati after storming his home, searching it, and ransacking its contents.
Local sources reported that soldiers interrogated family members inside the home before taking Nabil to an undisclosed location.
In the town of Beit Ummar, north of Hebron, armed colonizers released large herds of livestock into Palestinian‑owned agricultural lands in the Khirbet Al‑Qet area, destroying grape vineyards and productive peach orchards.
Residents said the colonizers have been escalating their attacks since early this year, when a group seized part of the community’s land, installed a mobile home, and brought in livestock. Since then, Israeli forces have prevented Palestinian farmers from accessing their lands in the area.
In a related incident, armed colonizers attacked Palestinian farmers while they were harvesting their crops in the Khallet Al‑Hummus area of Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron. The colonizers forced the farmers to leave their fields and stole hand tools and agricultural produce belonging to local resident Hammad Id’ais.
Also, a Palestinian man was injured on Thursday evening after Israeli colonizers attacked his vehicle between the village of Al-Lubban ash-Sharqiya, east of Nablus in northern West Bank, and the city of Salfit, in the central occupied West Bank.
The Wall & Colonization Resistance Commission stated that these attacks form part of a systematic effort to expand colonies and forcibly restrict Palestinian access to agricultural lands across Hebron and the South Hebron Hills, where colonizer violence continues to rise under direct military protection.
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 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits collective punishment and acts of terror against civilian populations.
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”.
Articles 53 and 147, prohibit the destruction of civilian property and classify pillage as a war crime.
