Israeli occupation threatens to demolish 88 homes in Al Walja village and displace its people

Dozens of houses in the village of Al Walaja, southwest of the occupied city of Jerusalem, are threatened with demolition by the Israeli occupation, which continues to rob the village’s lands since al-Nakba (Usurpation of Palestine)  in 1948 and plunder its resources. But the people of Al-Waljah face the occupation, its crimes and schemes by standing firm on their land to thwart its attempts to perpetuate the fait accompli policy of seizing the land.

The village is 5.8 km southwest of Jerusalem and 4 km north of Bethlehem. It is one of the oldest Palestinian villages where the Canaanite Arabs inhabited it five thousand years ago. It is characterized by the fertility of its lands, abundance of water, charming nature, plenty of  springs, and an area of 17,793 dunums. But in 1948 the occupation demolished its buildings and homes and seized an area of 11,793 dunums to establish a settlement on its lands. Then the occupation later seized 1,500 dunums to establish a second settlement and expand bypass roads to serve the settlers. Thus, the village was left with only 4,500 dunums and the occupation is currently working to seize it to expand the apartheid wall and establish new settlement units.

n a statement to SANA reporter, the head of the village council of Walja, Khader al-Araj, pointed out that the occupation will start the demolition process on the 26th  of this month, as it will extend to 88 houses, comprising half of the houses of Ain Jweizah neighborhood. This will lead to the displacement and the suffering of tens of families. During the last years, the occupation  demolished 97 facilities and 28 homes in a failed attempt to displace the villages’ locals who continue their struggle and confront the occupation’s plans aimed at isolating Palestinian villages and displacing their people within the policy of ethnic cleansing.

Al-Araj pointed out that the occupation seized 70 percent of the village’s lands, which is now surrounded by barbed wire and the apartheid wall. The Palestinians suffer as they exit and enter it, facing  the threat of fire from the occupation forces, which have placed huge iron gates at the entrances to the village.

For his part, a member of the Committee to Follow-up Situation of Homes Threatened with Demolition in the village of Al Walja, Ibrahim Al-Araj, said that the village is experiencing a continuous catastrophe, as the demolition of Palestinian homes and facilities has not stopped with the aim of seizing the lands of the village on which the occupation established settlements and surrounded it with the apartheid wall to completely isolate it from its Palestinian surroundings.

Ibrahim stressed that no matter how severe the occupation’s attacks and restrictions on the people of the village are, it will not be able to uproot them from their land, as they remain in it like an olive tree whose roots are deeply rooted in its land for more than five thousand years. 

The Director of the Office of the Resistance of the Wall and Settlement Commission in Bethlehem Hassan Breijieh indicated that the occupation bulldozers did not stop demolishing the village of Al Walja as part of a systematic plan to displace Palestinians from it, especially from the areas adjacent to the apartheid wall. In addition to that, the occupation did not allow the residents of the village to build new homes or expanding their homes, and it recently threatened to demolish dozens of existing Palestinian homes and facilities.

He noted  that the village of Al Walja constitutes the main gateway to the western countryside of Bethlehem, and the occupation’s seizure of its lands will lead to the siege of the city from the western side and deprive the Palestinians of their natural resources of water and agriculture. The occupation has established 27 settlements on Bethlehem lands and is expanding them continuously, he added.

Inas Abdulkareem