South Hebron Hills
South Hebron Hills, Tuesday 10/10/06, AM Watchers: Michal, Z., Hagit, B. (Reporting) 06:30 – 09:00 AMOur time is an hour behind the Palestinian time, which is an hour earlier.Closure, no one around at Sansana checkpoint, the name of which was changedto “Meytar”. A few workers are coming to work at the checkpoint itself.Ramadin checkpoint: The village is divided. Border Police soldiers. Two Palestinian cars pass with nobody stopping them. Why is this checkpointneeded at all?Road 60: No sudden apprehending on the road. All the blockings are up again. New earth mounds are blocking the way to the road everywhere. There is a very little traffic and all the pillboxes are manned. Sheep Junction: An army vehicle is standing there but is not stopping the traffic. We could not see soldiers. Were they sleeping in the car? Road 317: A checkpoint at the entrance to Yatir forest. 3 soldiers arestanding with a detainee who had no ID. He was trying to find work in Beer Sheba. He will not be released before 3 hours go by. The checkpoint now includes a new pillbox and a yellow gate. The pillbox is not yet manned and is right on the fence. When I went down to take a picture, the cameras caught me.We continued our way towards the next checkpoint. Kongo at the entrance to the city of Arad. At this location, a big, elaborate passageway was built. The soldiers occupying this spot (from an anti-aircraft unit, are detaining 7 people who came in a car with a fake yellow license plate. These are iron dealers who tried to take fence parts for iron. All are with no IDs and will be released after 3 hours. They are not observing Ramadan and are smoking and eating. The soldiers are giving them water and their breakfast leftovers. The soldiers take our IDs. We are not allowed to drive on this road. We are detained for 15 minutes and are released with a warning not to drive or take pictures on that road. Without Hebron, the emptiness is saddening and seems almost natural.
South Hebron Hills
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South Hebron Hills
South Hebron Hills is a large area in the West Bank's southern part.
Yatta is a major city in this area: right in the border zone between the fertile region of Hebron and its surroundings and the desert of the Hebron Hills. Yatta has about 64,000 inhabitants.
The surrounding villages are called Masafer Yatta (Yatta's daughter villages). Their inhabitants subsist on livestock and agriculture. Agriculture is possible only in small plots, especially near streams. Most of the area consists of rocky terraces.Since the beginning of the 1980s, many settlements have been established on the agricultural land cultivated by the Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills region: Carmel, Maon, Susia, Masadot Yehuda, Othniel, and more. Since the settlements were established and Palestinians cultivation areas have been reduced; the residents of the South Hebron Hills have been suffering from harassment by the settlers. Attempts to evict and demolish houses have continued, along with withholding water and electricity. The military and police usually refrain from intervening in violent incidents between settlers and Palestinians do not enforce the law when it comes to the investigation of extensive violent Jewish settlers. The harassment in the South Hebron Hills includes attacking and attempting to burn residential tents, harassing dogs, harming herds, and preventing access to pastures.
There are several checkpoints in the South Hebron Hills, on Routes 317 and 60. In most of them, no military presence is apparent, but rather an array of pillboxes monitor the villages. Roadblocks are frequently set up according to the settlers and the army's needs. These are located at the Zif Junction, the Dura-al Fawwar crossing, and the Sheep Junction at the southern entrance to Hebron.
Updated April 2022
MuhammadFeb-24-2026South Hebron Hill, Beit Hagai: Paving an internal security road
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