A video has emerged showing scuffles erupting between local residents and Israeli forces as they were demolishing two Palestinian homes in the southern Hebron Hills area of the occupied West Bank. RNA - In the video released on Friday Israeli forces are seen punching several men as they were dragging them away. Residents said two Palestinians were also detained.
In a statement on Friday, the Israeli Civil Administration alleged that the buildings in the Palestinian city of al-Khalil (Hebron) were built illegally.
The family who owned the houses said they were in the process of appealing to the Civil Administration to legalize the houses which were located in the strategically sensitive Area C of the occupied West Bank.
Area C accounts for more than 60 percent of the occupied West Bank, and would form a significant part of a future Palestine state under the so-called two-state solution. It is fully controlled by Israeli authorities.
Israeli officials have recently approved the construction of 6,000 new settler homes in the West Bank's Area C, where the Israeli army has full control over the management of resources, planning and construction, and strictly limits Palestinian construction or development to less than one percent of the area.
More than 600,000 Israelis live in over 230 illegal settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem al-Quds.
The UN Security Council has condemned Israel’s settlement activities in the occupied territories in several resolutions.
847/940