Deir Qal'a and Deir Sam'an - Palestinians are pushed out from Byzantine sites standing for over a millennium

The gate that blocks the way to the olive grove and the site

Photo:

Nurit Popper

Announcement in Haaretz newspaper

Photo:

Nurit Popper

Notice from the IDF. Order regarding the Land Law. Published in Haaretz newspaper on August 21, 2020

Sign of the Nature and Parks Protection Authority

Photo:

Nurit Popper

Near the entrance to Deir Qala, a large sign of the Nature and Parks Protection Authority informs about the Nahal Shilo Ili Nature Reserve

Waiting for Z. near the entrance to the Byzantine church

Photo:

Nurit Popper

The gate to the Byzantine church

Photo:

Nurit Popper

Olive tree whose roots were exposed due to army excavations

Photo:

Nurit Popper

Irrigation pool at Deir Sam'an turned into a Mikveh

Photo:

Uri Erlich Equal Valley

The gate to the site through Leshem settlement

Photo:

Nurit Popper

The gate to the site in Deir Saman through Leshem settlement

The ancient structure in the Deir Sam'an

Photo:

Nurit Popper

Zvia and P. at the entrance to the ancient structure in the Deir Saman where P.’s father died

Why do we take the trouble to report in Corona times as well?

Because democracy’s watchdogs have fallen asleep on their own watch, so Israeli citizens have no idea what is actually happening in the Occupied Territories, especially now.

Day and night, Israeli soldiers (as the State’s emissaries) help extreme settler-colonists take the law into their own hands, unhampered. They do not stop even in days of a raging pandemic and do not hesitate to harm Palestinians – their bodies, property, and sources of livelihood.

Unceasing harassment of the weakened Palestinian population inflicts psychological harm as well. All – from babies through and including the elderly and the ill – are open prey to Jewish violence and terrorism which the settler-colonists are only too eager to exert.

We of MachsomWatch will not cease to report, certainly not now during these Corona times and under the threat of annexation, about the settlers’ increased rampages, those who hurry to set facts on the ground helped by the Israeli army.

Israel rules the West Bank, and by force of the Geneva Convention, article no. 27, it is committed to enforcing law and order there. The inhabitants of these Occupied Territories have the legal right “to decent treatment of their body and dignity, and should be especially protected against any act of violence”.

Ironically, this is not at all upheld.

Nor shall we cooperate with the commonplace ignoring of the Palestinian people’s suffering, and with the Israeli public’s indifference to it. We shall continue to follow up closely and report the goings-on in the West Bank, in its villages and encampments.

No one should be able to say ‘We knew nothing, we heard nothing’