Israeli Army Detains 14 Palestinians, Including Former Prisoners, in West Bank Raids

Rasa - Israeli Army detained 14 Palestinians, including eight former prisoners, in raids across the West Bank districts, Palestinian security sources on Wednesday.

News ID: 427780

Date: 01 March 2017 - 20:01

RNA - Israeli army, in Bethlehem, detained eight former prisoners during search-and-arrest campaign carried out across the Bethlehem area, WAFA reported.

Meanwhile, the Israeli forces detained three Palestinians, including two brothers, after raiding and wreaking havoc to their homes in the towns of Samou and Dora, South of Hebron.

Three other Palestinians from Balata refugee camp in Nablus were detained at a flying military checkpoint to the East of Nablus.

In a separate incident, Israeli forces demolished a building in the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood of Issawiya on Wednesday morning without giving prior warning, leaving 30 Palestinians homeless, under the pretext that the building lacked the nearly impossible to obtain construction permits required by Israeli authorities.

It was the third time the building, a two-level apartment comprised of four units, was destroyed over the course of a 15-year administrative battle to legalize the structure.

Dozens of Israeli special forces, bulldozers, and crews from Israel’s Jerusalem municipality raided Issawiya at around 4:30 a.m. and surrounded a the building, owned by Khalid Nimr Mahmoud.

Witnesses told Ma'an that residents of the building were forced outside before they had time to evacuate their belongings.

Israeli authorities have stepped up issuing demolition warrants for Palestinians in East Jerusalem, particularly after Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barakat warned that the demolition of the illegal Israeli outpost of Amona in the occupied West Bank would be met with the mass demolition of Palestinian homes lacking the nearly impossible to obtain Israeli-issued building permits.

Last month, Israeli authorities demolished at least three homes in Issawiya in a singe day, and in January, a man in the neighborhood was forced to demolish his own home in compliance with an order from the municipality.

According to UN documentation, as Feb. 20, 33 Palestinian-owned structures were demolished by Israel in East Jerusalem since the beginning of the year, displacing at least 57 Palestinians. A total of 190 Palestinian buildings were demolished in East Jerusalem in 2016.

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