Bi-Weekly Brief for November 29, 2021
A one page digest of Israel’s ongoing dispossession of Palestinian land and livelihoods, and Palestinian resistance.
What will it take to curb Israel’s appetite for Palestinian land?
In the build up to November 29, the day designated by the UN in Dec. 1977 as an annual International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, the General Assembly affirmed Palestinian sovereignty over its natural resources, including land and water. The vote was typically lopsided, with 157 countries in support and 7 opposing – the US, Israel, Canada, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, and Palau. While the US is unwilling to back the international consensus at the UN, American behind-the-scenes pressure appears to have one achievement: on Nov. 25 Israel told the US it would shelve the plan to build 9,000 settlement unitsapproved by the Jerusalem Municipality for the Atarot airport site that had been long reserved for Palestinian housing. Meanwhile on Nov. 24, Belgium – following a ruling in 2019 by the EU’s top court – said it would be labeling products made in Israel settlements. In response the visiting Israeli deputy foreign minister scrapped his diplomatic meetings.
Despite outcry and lack of evidence Israel remains intent on silencing Palestinian civil society
International outrage has not to date induced Israel to rescind its Oct. designation of prominent Palestinian human rights groups as ‘terrorist organizations.’ On Nov. 16, an Israeli military court dismissed an allegation put forward as ‘evidence’ of the groups’ ties to the PFLP. Unlike the EU and some Members of Congress, including MA Reps. Pressley and McGovern, the Biden administration had little to say for a month. Finally, on Nov. 20, US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield declared: “We support Palestinian NGOs’ role monitoring human rights abuses wherever they occur.”
Settler thugs, soldiers and bureaucracy combine forces to drive Palestinians off their land
Rampant violence, which has enabled settler outposts to seize control of 50,000 acres (200,000 dunums) of Palestinian land, has met with some hand-wringing on the part of Foreign Minister Gantz and criticism by visiting Members of Congress, but little concrete action. With the olive harvest winding down, settlers have opened fire on Palestinian homes, stoned drivers on roads, smashed windows and slashed car tires, while soldiers uprooted hundreds of olive trees in Salfit and injured scores in anti-settlement protests. According to the report ‘Creeping Dispossession’ by the Israeli group Hamoked, over the last 8 years many Palestinians have been forced to abandon agriculture because of increasingly draconian bureaucratic methods preventing them from accessing the 9.4% of the West Bank that is on the wrong side of Israel’s ‘separation barrier.’
No end to collective punishment inflicted on the Gaza Strip
On Nov. 22, bulldozers and tanks moved into the Gaza Strip to level agricultural land. Israel continues to ban the entry of 62 types of what it calls ‘dual use items,’ including those essential to repair the 56,000 homes and the water, sanitation and electricity infrastructure damaged in the May 2021 offensive. With reconstruction delayed, winter rains have flooded the damaged homes.
Water Fact
On Nov. 22, Israel, Jordan and the UAE signed a deal in Dubai under which a large solar farm would be constructed by an Emirati company in the Jordanian desert to supply 2% of Israel’s energy needs by 2030. In return, Israel has agreed to more than double the amount of water it sells to water-starved Jordan. US climate czar John Kerry attended the signing ceremony, which was presented as a product of the Abraham Accords, praised as ‘a Green Blue Deal for the Middle East’ and opposed by thousands of Jordanians who took to the streets in opposition. On the same day as the water-for-energy agreement was signed, Israeli soldiers ordered a halt on construction of a water well near Tubas in the West Bank which would have supplied the irrigation needs of the village of Atuf.
Compiled by The Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine
Banner design by Paul Normandia of Red Sun Press