• Violation: uprooting palm trees

• Location: Al-Matar area, east of Jericho

• Date : March 8, 2017.

• Perpetrators : the so-called civil administration in coordination with the occupation army.

• Victims: 4 agricultural families in the Jericho area.

 

• Details :

     In the morning hours of Wednesday, March 08 , 2017, a large force of the Israeli occupation army stormed with a military bulldozer and a truck carrying a tanker the area known as the "Al-Matar" , east of the city of Jericho, uprooted 400 palm trees ( 3 years old) planted on 30 dunums, and stole them via the accompanying  truck. Noteworthy, the trees were transferred to an unknown location.

   Reportedly,  in the course of uprooting, the accompanying  bulldozer destructed irrigation networks founded in the area as follows:

• 200 m of irrigation network lines with a diameter of 75 inches.

• 400 m of irrigation networks with 5 inch diameter.

• 400 m of irrigation networks with 25 inch diameter.

• 600 m of irrigation networks with 6 inch diameter.

Photos 1-6: the attack location

     Noteworthy, the trees and the irrigation systems are owned by: Mohammad Mustafa Saleh Awajneh, Khamis Mahmood Mishleh, Yazen Rajeh Rimawi and Fahmi Dahdah, who use the land as partners on the basis of the farmer's contracts with the landowner Mustafa Saleh Awajna.

   The occupation has justified the uprooting of these trees from the area of ​​"Al-Matar" under the pretext of cultivation within what is known as "State Land" according to the description of the occupation.

 

About Al-Matar area:

 

It is of 280 dunums in area and used to be a military camp during the British mandate. The area was later transferred to the Jordanian Treasury Department, which intended to establish an airport on it.

In 1969, the Israeli occupation established a colony named Yasha' in the area, which was later dismantled in 1999.

In 2016, the so-called Israel Civil Administration imposed a rent policy on the area's farmers. They made farmers sign contacts to use the lands that were originally theirs but were taken via confiscation. The occupation constantly harass farmers on the claim of not paying rent. It is a systematic plan to forcibly displace Palestinians from the area.

Since 1967, the Israeli occupation worked hard to confiscate all water resources in the area Palestinian Jordan Valley "al-Ghoor" for the favor of the nearby colonies. Such colonies flourished at the expense of the nearby Palestinian lands.

Ever since that year, underground and springs water decreased until dried up. An observer can note how miserable the water currents of al-Auja area became; rubbish and dirt surface on top of the water currents.

 

Prepared by
 The Land Research Center
LRC