Israeli measures on occupied West Bank ‘dangerous, violation of international law’: Palestinian official

By Aysar Alais

RAMALLAH, Palestine (AA) – A Palestinian official on Monday called recent Israeli decisions aimed at changing the legal and civil status in the occupied West Bank “dangerous,” saying that they go beyond international law and laws in force before the 1967 Israeli occupation of the territory.

On Sunday, Israel’s Security Cabinet ordered the repealing of a law barring the sale of Palestinian land to Jews in the West Bank, unsealing land ownership records, and transferring building permit authority in a Hebron settlement bloc from the Palestinian municipality to Israel’s civil administration.

The measures also expand Israeli oversight and enforcement into areas classified as Area A and Area B, citing alleged violations related to unlicensed construction, water issues, and damage to archaeological and environmental sites.

The decisions “are dangerous and give Israeli measures in the West Bank a legal character that alters the fundamental nature of Palestinian land,” Amir Dawood, Director of Documentation and Publication at the Commission, told Anadolu.

He said the new measures allow illegal Israeli settlers “to purchase property in the West Bank, in violation of international law and the laws that were in force prior to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank in 1967, and amount to an Israeli declaration of renouncing the 1997 Hebron Agreement.”

According to the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth, the measures are expected to bring sweeping changes to land registration and purchasing mechanisms in the West Bank.

“The Israeli decisions are an attempt to systematically change the geographical nature of the Palestinian land, through official titles and procedures,” Dawood warned.

For years, he said, Israel has been working to strip the Palestinian Authority of its powers in several locations across the West Bank, including archaeological sites in Bethlehem and Hebron “in a blatant assault on Palestinian sovereignty.”

Under the Hebron Agreement signed in 1997 between the Palestine Liberation Organization and Israel, the city of Hebron was divided into two areas, H1 and H2.

H1, which makes up most of the city, falls under Palestinian Authority administration, while H2, which includes the Old City and the Ibrahimi Mosque, remains under Israeli control.

Dawood said the pace of Israeli attacks and settlement building has reached their peak since Tel Aviv’s war on Gaza in October 2023.

“Israel is racing against time to impose new facts on Palestinian land,” he said.

“We are talking about more than 10,000 attacks carried out by illegal settlers, which resulted in the death of 36 Palestinians. This reflects the scale of settler empowerment since the Gaza war,” he said.

Dawood also cited the building of more than 150 new settlement outposts since the Gaza war.

“This means that illegal settlers have been granted all privileges in the West Bank,” he added.

Over the past three years, the Israeli government has reviewed plans for building around 50,000 settlement units in the West Bank, in addition to the confiscation of 60,000 dunams (14,826 acres) of land during the war.

Dawood underlined the importance of “Palestinian steadfastness on the land and confronting Israel’s plans with all available means,” renewing his call on the international community “to stop Israel’s crimes and curb its actions on the ground.”

The International Court of Justice declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory illegal in a landmark opinion in July 2024 and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

*Writing by Rania Abushamala