On Saturday, Israeli soldiers isolated many Palestinian villages and Bedouin communities in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron, in the West Bank’s southern part.
Nidal Younis, the head of Masafer Yatta Village Council, said the soldiers used bulldozers to place sand mounds on the entrances of Janba and Al-Markaz.
He added that the soldiers prevented the Palestinians from entering or leaving their villages without going through gates they installed in the area.
A few days ago, the army threatened to confiscate Palestinian vehicles and impose hefty fines on any Palestinian who enters those villages or leaves them without going through the ‘security gate,’ effectively turning the villages into open-air prisons.
The Palestinians in Masafer Yatta are subject to constant Israeli violations and attacks by soldiers and illegal colonizers and face repeated demolitions of homes, sheds, and structures, in addition to attacks targeting the shepherds.
The illegal colonizers frequently attack farmers and shepherds, burnt farmlands, and demolished sheds.
The Israeli army also bars the farmers from reaching large areas of their lands due to military drills using live fire and explosives.
