Israeli forces raze cultivated land in southern West Bank town

Israeli occupation forces Thursday razed privately-owned cultivated land in the Beit Ummar town, north of the occupied West Bank city of Hebron, according to a media activist. Mohammad Awad said that the occupation forces, escorting a bulldozer, barged their way into the southeastern part of the town, where the heavy machinery bulldozed over 10 dunums of land cultivated with vegetables, grapevines and olives and belonging to the brothers Ghazi, Hatem and Fayez Abu Ayyash, destroying it and causing substantial losses. Ghazi, one of the landowners, said that the occupation forces locked his family along with his two brothers' families inside their houses and prevented them from exiting while the bulldozer was razing their land. After the bulldozer flattened the cultivated land, the gun-toting soldiers fired barrages of live ammunition and tear gas canisters towards the houses of the town residents, resulting in several suffocation cases. The occupation forces frequently conduct raids daily across the West B ank on the pretext of searching for 'wanted' Palestinians, triggering clashes with residents. These raids are conducted without a search warrant, whenever and wherever the military chooses in keeping with its sweeping arbitrary powers. Under Israeli military law army commanders have full executive, legislative and judicial authority over 3 million Palestinians living in the West Bank. Palestinians have no say in how this authority is exercised. Source: Palestine News and Information Agency – WAFA