Illegal paramilitary Israeli colonizers burned two Palestinian vehicles at dawn Friday during an attack on homes south of Hebron, while Israeli occupation forces detonated the doors of several commercial shops and invaded homes in nearby towns, in the southern occupied West Bank.
Local activist Osama Makhamra said that a group of armed colonizers from the Otniel illegal colony infiltrated the Majd Al‑Baa’ area west of Yatta and set fire to two vehicles belonging to brothers Khaled and Yasser Abu Ali, destroying them completely.
Residents reported that the colonizers approached the homes under the cover of darkness and torched the cars before fleeing toward the colony.
In a related incident, Israeli occupation forces detonated the doors of several commercial shops in Yatta before invading them, searching the premises, and ransacking their contents. No arrests were reported.
In the nearby town of Beit Awwa, west of Hebron, Israeli soldiers invaded the home of Mohammad Al‑Okeimi, searched it extensively, and deliberately damaged household belongings. Residents said the invasion lasted for an extended period, and soldiers withdrew without detaining anyone.
Human rights groups have documented a sharp rise in coordinated attacks by colonizers and the army across the Hebron governorate, particularly in the South Hebron Hills, where Palestinian communities face repeated assaults, property destruction, and movement restrictions aimed at expanding colonies and displacing residents.
On Thursday, Israeli forces abducted a Palestinian man, while Israeli colonizers destroyed agricultural fields and fruit orchards in several areas of the Hebron governorate.
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.
