On April the 7th at 6 am the village of Al Aqaba,woke up to find the Israeli Army destroying thier road and two homes.

 

Two Caterpillar bulldozers were with the military jeeps.They demolished two concrete houses leaving a families homeless, one with 11 children, and the other with 7 children. Their animal shelters had also been destroyed. At one of the houses they put in the family’s belongings in the septic tank so it would not be possilbe for them to use them again.

 

They destroyed over 1km of tarmac road that wound around the hills of the village, despite there being a demolition order for just 400m of the road.

One of the roads is ironically named Peace Street and is a vital link with the Jordan Valley.The bulldozers also created mounds with the rubble along the road to make it impossible for any vehicle to drive along it. Six families are now living between two of these earth mounds, unable to drive to or from their homes.

There are 400 people living in the village, and all but six of the houses have demolition orders on them: four cannot be demoished because they have been there since before 1948.

95% of Al Aqaba, in area C, received demolition orders from the Occupation Authority in 2006. Since then they have been mounting a legal challenge, but it is apparent the occupation army does not wish to wait for their own Israeli `law`.

700 people were forced out of their land in 2006, but the entire village was granted a freeze on their demolition orders until the end of 2011 to give the opportunity to resolve the situation peacefully.

However, 18 families received new demolition orders just a week ago, under which the army could come a demolish their homes any time after 5th May 2011.

Background information about the village is available on their own website at http://www.saveaqaba.org/

See more pictures at http://chroniquespalestine.blogspot.com/