Home Demolitions

To start off with today, I’ll just give a few facts about the Wall that Israel is building around and through Palestine. When completed, it’ll be about 790 km, which is about twice the length of the Green Line, which is supposed to be the “border” between Israel and Palestine. It’ll de facto annex about 50% of the West Bank, confiscating the land for exclusive Israeli use, and most of what will be confiscated is the most fertile agricultural land, and the invaluable underground water resources located in Palestinian territory. It goes straight through some communities, dividing families from one another, and it snakes right next to others, leaving no room for the villages to expand, and cutting off their farmlands. Meanwhile, Israeli settlements are left with huge tracts of land where they can expand. Ultimately, the Wall will work with the settlements to divide the West Bank into three separate cantons with little or no contiguity, making it almost impossible to sustain a Palestinian state.

One of the other effects of the Wall is that it has become a “legitimate” reason to demolish homes. The other day, I visited a spot where about six homes had been demolished because they were deemed to be too close to the Wall. In this area, Israel declared that houses had to be at least 1 km away from the Wall. It didn’t matter that these houses had been built before the Wall was constructed; the point was that the path of the Wall was less than 1 km away from the houses, so they had to be destroyed.

So the families who lived in these houses were given a piece of paper written in Hebrew saying that in 24 hours, their homes would be demolished due to their proximity to the Wall. Of course, most Palestinians don’t read Hebrew because their language is Arabic. So maybe they knew what the demolition order said, maybe they didn’t. But keep in mind that they were living inside the Green Line, which means according to internationally accepted borders, they were in Palestine, not Israel. So, knowing that the families were Palestinians living in Palestine, why wouldn’t the Israeli government make an Arabic translation of their demolition order? Also, even if they did read Hebrew, why would Israel only give them 24 hours notice before demolishing their homes? This lack of notice is another violation of international law.

So anyways, at 2 or 3 in the morning on the next day, an Israeli army unit with a fleet of bulldozers showed up at the houses, ready to start the demolition. Imagine waking up in the middle of the night to a bunch of soldiers and bulldozers ready to raze your house to the ground. The families weren’t allowed to take any of their furniture or belongings out of their houses before the bulldozers started their work. They were given no compensation, and were offered no alternative place to live. In one night, five homes were demolished, and five families lost everything they had.

The Wall isn’t the only reason for house demolitions, but it certainly doesn’t help the issue. Since 1967, about 19,000 Palestinian homes have been destroyed, and more demolition orders are issued every day. How is this justifiable? Where’s the humanity here? I’m not sure questions like these have any answers. The only thing we can do is try and resist the occupation, and to show our solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for liberation.