New Israeli barrier in Jordan Valley to deprive Palestinians of farmland, water

By Qais Abu Samra and Betul Yilmaz

RAMALLAH, Palestine / ISTANBUL (AA) - A new Israeli plan to build a separation wall between the northern Jordan Valley and the West Bank has sparked Palestinian fears of isolating their communities and farmlands and consolidating the de facto annexation of the occupied territory.

Tel Aviv has already built a separation wall between Israel and the West Bank in 2002, a barrier deemed by Palestinians as an “apartheid wall.” In 2004, the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion condemning the barrier and deeming it illegal.

Now, the Israeli army is planning to build a new wall deep inside the northern Jordan Valley, stretching about 22 kilometers in length and 50 meters in width, to isolate Palestinian communities from their farmlands and grazing areas, according to the Haaretz newspaper.

The barrier, called “Scarlet Thread,” will set out the destruction of many Palestinian structures along its route, including homes, livestock pens, greenhouses, and warehouses, as well as water networks, wells, and agricultural land.

Haaretz said the wall is part of a broader plan to isolate Palestinian residents across the Jordan Valley, although there has not been a complete roadmap to date.

According to an Israeli military document issued last August, the wall will include a military road, earthen embankments, and channels, in addition to a 20-meter-wide “security zone” on both sides, allegedly to protect illegal settlers and prevent arms smuggling. Nearby Palestinian structures are classified in the document as “security gaps” that must be removed.

The document was issued by the head of the army’s Central Command, Avi Bluth, and was published by Israeli media.

- Outright annexation

Khairallah Bani Ouda, a Palestinian farmer, stands at the edge of the plain in Atouf village in the Jordan Valley, watching his land and fearing for his farmland.

“This road will not be just a street; it will be the beginning of a wall that will isolate residents from their land,” Khairallah told Anadolu.

Possessing 80,000 square meters of land, which provides a livelihood for his 27-member family, Khairallah said: “I have been living here since 2017. This is my land.”

The Palestinian farmer said that the Israeli wall would eat up half of the plain.

“I will end up outside the wall,” he said in deep sorrow, “Where will I go? Is there another planet for me to go to?"

“If the Israeli occupation builds the wall, that means pushing us away from our land. This is outright annexation,” he said.

“This is not a security project; it is an expansion, because they want the land without its people.”

- Loss of land

A few hundred meters away, Jamal Bani Ouda stands overlooking the same plain.

“This is not a military road as the Israeli army claims, but an initial line for a silent annexation process expanding in the Jordan Valley through two tracks: military orders and pastoral settlement outposts,” he told Anadolu.

The Palestinian farmer pointed to daily activities by illegal Israeli settler in the village.

“In front of us, there is a settler with livestock who has fenced off more than 10,000 dunams of land in the area."

“These are our lands—an extension of our lives and our history,” he said.

The consequences of the Israeli plan “will be catastrophic, including the loss of land, unemployment, and the destruction of the livelihoods of hundreds of Palestinian families,” Jamal said.

Farmers in the Atouf village alone estimate that more than 30,000 dunams (one dunam equals 1,000 square meters) are threatened by the Israeli wall, saying that the Israeli plan covers about 190,000 dunams across the entire farmlands in the northern Jordan Valley.

- Ending Palestinian existence

Moataz Bisharat, a local Palestinian official in charge of the Jordan Valley affairs, said the 22-kilometer wall extends from Ein Shibli, where a new military site is being established to become a permanent crossing, passing through the Al-Baqi’a plain and the lands of Tamun and Tubas, all the way to east of Tayasir.

“This road is not a military route as the Israeli army claims, but rather a route for a wall separating the northern Jordan Valley from the rest of the West Bank,” he said.

“The most dangerous aspect is the complete separation, as more than 190,000 dunams east of the road will become isolated from their surroundings, in addition to thousands of dunams planted with vegetables, olive trees, and bananas, as well as water lines—all of which are threatened with removal.”

Bisharat warned that the Israeli plan “goes beyond land confiscation to threatening existence itself.”

The Israeli wall puts 22 residential communities comprising about 600 families at risk, with notices issued for Palestinian homes and sheep pens in the area, he said.

Regarding the implications of the Israeli plan, Bisharat said it “means ending the Palestinian presence and eliminating the Palestinian food basket.”

The Jordan Valley contains the Eastern Aquifer Basin, the second-largest source of water in the West Bank. The separation of the Jordan Valley would mean depriving Palestinians of all water resources.

Bisharat, who is like many Palestinians, is likely to lose 200 dunams of his land planted with olives, grapes and vegetables if the Israeli wall is built.

The wall “will completely prevent my family from accessing the land,” he said.

“There can be no Palestinian state without the Jordan Valley. Today, the Palestinian state is being left without borders, without water, and without a food basket. What is happening is a war on Palestinian existence amid incomprehensible world silence.”

The Israeli plan comes at a time when the West Bank is witnessing an unprecedented escalation in attacks by the Israeli army and illegal settlers against Palestinians and their property, where at least 1,093 people have been killed and nearly 11,000 injured since October 2023.

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