At-Tuwani - the army stops settler violence due to documentation

Place:

A-Tuwani

South Hebron Hills

Susiya

Tags:

Settler-colonists injure Palestinians body, soul and property

Observers:

Muhammad, Daphna and a guest. Editing: Mira Balaban; Translator: Natanya

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Apr-9-2023

Morning

At-Tuwani - visiting Basel al-Adara

Photo:

Muhammad D

We went to At-Tuwani, to meet Nasser and Bassel al-Adara. According to them, the situation is getting worse and worse, the settlers allow themselves to hurt more and more. In the last few days, they patrolled the entire area, claiming that their sheep had been stolen. They allow themselves to search inside the houses, make barriers and check. When an army is ordered, they leave the place, but later return.

The day before our visit, they killed some sheep (documented in the activists' post), cut water lines, pinched car wheels. In practice, the settlers are in the area all the time and do not allow the locals to roam freely.

Some of the residents of the villages are unable to cultivate the fields, or take the sheep out to pasture, because they come to frighten and drive them away. Even at night, the settlers are active: for example, they light a small fire in the area, and inform the police that the Palestinians did it. Then the army comes to them, goes around the village and searches.

In At-Tuwani, the army and the police intervene more and act against the settlers, because they have many people who document (guests and local activists).

In more distant villages, the settlers allow themselves more, without hindrance.

Nasser tells us that he received a donation for the purchase of a transportation vehicle, for transporting the children of the villages in the surrounding area to school.

Azzam, from Susiya, also tells about the daily incidents and vulnerabilities in them.

We met everyone at home, because the visit was held on Passover, when there is a general closure info-icon on the territories and they don't go to work!

We have added a video filmed in At-Tuwani: Nasser with a soldier. It emphasizes a phenomenon we have recently seen in the Southern Hebron Hills: soldiers hide their faces. Sometimes in corona masks or woolen hats.

Location Description

Yata / Southern Hebron hills

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Yatta is a city located in the South Hebron Hills region. It is located in the border zone between the fertile area of Hebron and its surroundings and the desert of the Hebron Hills. Yatta has about 64,000 inhabitants. The surrounding villages are called Masafar Yatta (Yatta's daughter villages). Their inhabitants subsist on livestock and agriculture. Agriculture is possible only in small plots, especially near streams. Most of the area consists of rocky terraces.

Since the beginning of the 1980s, a number of settlements have been established on the agricultural land cultivated by the Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills region: Carmel, Maon, Susia, Masadot Yehuda, Othniel, and more. Since the settlements were established and Palestinians cultivation areas have been reduced; the residents of the South Hebron Hills have been suffering from harassment by the settlers. Attempts to evict and demolish houses have continued, along with the withholding of water and electricity. The military and police usually refrain from intervening in violent incidents between settlers and Palestinians do not enforce the law when it comes to the investigation of extensive violent Jewish settlers. The harassment in the South Hebron Hills includes attacking and attempting to burn residential tents, harassing dogs, harming herds, and preventing access to pastures.

There are several checkpoints in the South Hebron Hills, on Routes 317 and 60. In most of them, no military presence is apparent, but rather an array of pillboxes monitor the villages. Road blocks are frequently set up according to the settlers and the army's needs. These are located at the Zif Junction, the Dura-al Fawwar crossing, and the Sheep Junction at the southern entrance to Hebron.

Updated April 2022

Apr-10-2024

Muhammad D.

Sa'ir - Yael and Ahmad

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Susiya

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The Palestinian area lies between the settlement of Susya and a military base.
The residents began to settle in areas outside the villages in the 1830s and lived in caves, tents and sukkot. To this day they maintain a traditional lifestyle and their livelihood is based on agriculture and herding. Until the 1948 war, the farmers cultivated areas that extended to the Arad area. As a result of the war, a significant portion of their land left on the Israeli side was lost. After the 1967 war and the Israeli occupation, military camps were established in the area, fire zones and nature reserves were declared, and the land area was further reduced.

The Jewish settlement in Susya began in 1979. Since then, there has been a stubborn struggle to remove the remains of Palestinian residents who refuse to leave their place of birth and move to nearby town Yatta. With the development of a tourist site in Khirbet Susya in the late 1980s (an ancient synagogue), dozens of families living in caves in its vicinity were deported. In the second half of the 1990s, a new form of settlement developed in the area - shepherds' farms of individual settlers. This phenomenon increased the tension between the settlers and the original, Palestinian residents, and led to repeated harassment of the residents of the farms towards the Palestinians. At the same time, demolition of buildings and crop destruction by security forces continued, as well as water and electricity prevention. In the Palestinian Susya, as in a large part of the villages of the southern Hebron Mountains, there is no running water, but the water pipe that supplies water to the Susya Jewish settlement passes through it. Palestinians have to buy expensive water that comes in tankers. Solar electricity is provided by a collector system, installed with donation funds. But the frequent demolitions in the villages do not spare water cisterns or the solar panels and power poles designed to transfer solar electricity between the villages.

Updated April 2021, Anat T.

At-Tuwani

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The locals came to At-Tuwani during the 20th century from the village of Yatta. They settled in abandoned ruins, utilizing the arable land, pastures for grazing sheep and the abundance of natural caves for habitation. The residents who settled in the caves came from families who could not purchase land for houses in the mother villages, as well as shepherds who did not have enough land to graze. They were joined by clan members who quarreled with other families in the mother locality.
Some of the residents today live in concrete buildings built above the caves. In the area of the village are several water cisterns and an ancient water well called Ein at-Tuwani. Local residents are forced to buy water in containers and transport them through many road blocks to the village. With the help of international organizations, an electrical system was installed in the village. In the late 90s of the 20th century, an elementary school was established in the serving several small villages in the area.
In 2004, MachsomWatch began visiting and reporting from the Khirbet Tuwani cave village, which suffers badly from the settlers of nearby outposts, and especially from the extremist Ma'on outpost. . The settlers contaminate cisterns, poison the flocks and uproot trees.

Particularly notable is the harassment of children from the surrounding villages on their way to school in at-Tuwani, so much so that military escort of children is required to separate them from the attackers (this was arranged following an initiative of the organization's members). In the past year, the escort has been without the vital presence of overseas volunteers.

Near at-Tuwani there are several families who have returned to the caves due to the incessant demolitions of the civil administration info-icon (as there is a total construction ban in all of area C). Destroyed are not only residential and agricultural buildings, but also water pipes, machinery. Even water cisterns are clogged up. at-Tuwani residents have created an association for non-violent demolition protests, but in the past year the army’s harsh harassment and settler violence have intensified and escalated. The incident of the small generator confiscation, which left a young man paralyzed, is one of many examples - any legitimate protection of property rights leads to violence and even shootings by the army and the civil administration.

Updated April 2022

Apr-10-2024

Muhammad D.

Sa'ir - Yael and Ahmad

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