This is how it starts. A small number of Israeli settlers put some caravans on Palestinian land. Officially it is illegal, but unofficially it is sanctioned by the apartheid state. They become established, they build permanent houses, a tarmac road, more houses, maybe some flats and a school. All in collaboration with and under the protection of the occupying army.

On 19th April 2022, a group of settlers installed two caravans in the Ihmayyer area, on land belonging to the Palestinian of the community of Al Farsiya.

We know what will happen next because we have seen it before, less than 5km away on the hills above Ein El Hilwe (translated as Sweet Spring). In 2002 some colonisers moved onto the hill in their caravans, joined in 2005 by colonisers from Gaza. By 2009 they were building their first houses. Now it is a huge development – a colony called Maskiyyot. Just hearing the word, Maskiyyot, brings to mind the repeated attacks on Palestinians living in the valleys below – families have been brutally harassed, shepherds attacked, and the community of Ein El Hilwe have had their fresh water spring stolen from them.

Maskiyot 2009
Maskiyot 2019

This will happen to the community of Al Farisiya if we don’t stop it. The new caravans will pave the way for the construction of a new settlement and the confiscation of yet more Palestinian lands.

These are not the actions of a few Mavericks. It is all part of the policy implemented by settlement organisations on behalf of the apartheid state. At its heart, is the aim to control all the lands and harass the Palestinian population until forcibly displacing them from the Jordan Valley. This is ethnic cleansing.

On the same day, 19th April 2022, Israel’s National Nature Assessment Program erected a sign declaring Ein El-Hilwe area a natural reserve and calling it Rotem and Al-Sakot after nearby colonies, thus erasing the Palestinian community and heritage from the area. This is the next stage of the theft of this land. Ten years ago, this land was declared a closed military area to deter Palestinians from accessing it, even though local shepherds have been feeding their animals there for generations. The declaration of a nature reserve further reinforces the settlers’ control of the spring and makes it illegal (under the laws of the apartheid state) for Palestinians to access it.

The local community is worried that the installation of this sign might be the first step for the Israeli occupation forces to install a fence that will further prevent Palestinians from accessing this land.