On Wednesday morning, Israeli occupation authorities, under heavy police protection, demolished 47 houses belonging to the Abu Asa family, near the village of Umm Butin in the Negev region in southern Israel.
During the large-scale operation, Israeli police abducted the young man, Ahmed Abu Asa, when he made an attempt to prevent the bulldozers from carrying out the demolition.
Head of the ‘Supreme Guidance Committee for the Arabs of the Negev’, Jumaa Al-Zabarqa, told Arab 48 that, “what happened this morning is an organized criminal operation, as it demolished 47 homes housing hundreds of Arab citizens, and this is a dangerous indicator of hostile practices towards Arab citizens in general.”
Al-Zabarqa continued, “the demolition and destruction forces, reinforced by large forces of police and border guards, are demolishing 47 homes for the Abu Asa family in the Hebron Valley area, leaving children, women, and the elderly without shelter and under the dome of the sky in the intense heat.”
Media sources said that the 47 homes were demolished by Israeli authorities under the pretext that the homes of the Abu Asa family were built without a permit.
In further comments, Al-Zabarqa called the operation “criminal and unprecedented since the Nakba,” adding that “What is happening now to the Abu Asa family is a real catastrophe, state terrorism, and a crime of ethnic cleansing.”
Author and expert in Israeli affairs, Amir Makhoul, stated that the targeting of the Negev region in the southern triangle of Israel, is aimed at the entire Palestinian Arab presence in the Negev.
Makhoul added that using the pretext of alleged “development”, including the extension of ‘Route 6’ has long been a strategic plan to sever any communication between the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
A massive-scale Israeli police force storms a Bedouin village in the Naqab region, south of 1948-occupied Palestine, in preparation for the demolition of over 60 homes sheltering local residents, according to local sources. pic.twitter.com/oBsY5seMrp
— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) May 8, 2024
