Recent Wave of Confiscations in the Palestinian Jordan Valley (Summary of the past week)

summarizing Daphne’s reports ( apparently indicating policy handed down from higher echelons)

September 11 – two cars and a truck at Ras Al Ahmar

September 12 – two cows that were grazing in the Umm Zuka nature reserve

September 13 – Daphne physically prevented the confiscation of two tractors and a car

The pirate settler-outpost in the Umm Zuka nature reserve continues to grow
This outpost was founded in January 2017 and moved deep into the reserve after it was made known that the outpost was independently drawing water from the nearby army base. The outpost continues to develop. The flock of cows belonging to the “owner” graze freely inside the nature reserve, whereas the Palestinians’ cows are confiscated as soon as they graze in the same place.

We were told by the person who seems in charge – Kobi – that he has the Israel Nature and Parks Authority’s approval to settle there. If this is indeed so, then a government authority (subordinate of the Ministry of Environmental Protection) is sanctioning an illegal outpost, the very outpost the illegality of which COGAT (Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories) has admitted in a letter to journalist Amira Hass. At any rate, the Authority has done nothing to evict the invaders, as it is obliged to do by the Law of Parks and Nature Reserves (Clauses 25, 28).

Now the outpost apparently draws its water from the pipe that supplies water to the settler-colony of Hemdat. Like all other settler-colonies, this one too receives water at cheap farming rates from the Israeli Mekorot water company. Namely – a government company supplies water (perhaps unknowingly) to an illegal settler-outpost.

Lately, according to their Palestinian neighbors, the outpost dwellers have been removing stones from a certain area in the nature reserve – reason not yet know.