{"id":200061,"date":"2026-07-10T14:51:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T14:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/200061\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T14:51:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T14:51:15","slug":"israel-accelerates-occupation-of-hebron-they-can-kill-us-at-any-moment-with-impunity-international","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/200061\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel accelerates occupation of Hebron: \u2018They can kill us at any moment with impunity\u2019 | International"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cDo you see all that trash? The settlers throw it here every day,\u201d says Islam Fajuri, a 38-year-old Palestinian, inside a house in Hebron\u2019s Old City (in the south of the West Bank occupied by Israel<\/a>). He looks up and points to a pile of cans, garbage bags and plastic caught in the bars of a courtyard roof threaded with wire. \u201cThe settlers have taken over the building next door, which used to be a guesthouse. Now they live right up against this Palestinian family\u2019s home and have threatened and beaten them several times,\u201d Fajuri continues. He also lives in the besieged, largely abandoned Old City and is friends with members of that household. They asked not to be identified for fear of further attacks by settlers.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut where the main Jewish settlements<\/a> are really visible is from the rooftop of this house. Let\u2019s go up,\u201d he suggests. Once on the roof, the view opens onto what is known as Hebron\u2019s H2 area, where, according to the Palestinian Authority census, between 700 and 850 settlers live protected by thousands of Israeli soldiers. From the heights you can see their houses with gardens, their family cars and Israeli flags flying everywhere. A few meters away, in the opposite direction, another roof reveals two Israeli soldiers with rifles on watch duty.<\/p>\n

\"\"Two Palestinian women walk along a street in the part of Hebron occupied by Israel, last June.Ammar Awad (REUTERS)<\/p>\n

It is the image of the Israeli occupation<\/a> that this Palestinian city has endured for decades, the object of Jewish nationalist claims tied to what Judaism calls the Tomb of the Patriarchs and what Islam calls the Ibrahami Mosque. The move has been accelerated by some of Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s most hard-line ministers, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich. The latest step comes as the legislative term nears its end: the suspension of the 1997 Hebron Accords.<\/p>\n

Signed, incidentally, by Netanyahu himself \u2014 who at the time was also Israel\u2019s prime minister, as he is now \u2014 and by the then-Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat as part of the Oslo Accords, the agreement stipulated that Israel should withdraw its troops from 80% of Hebron so that the Palestinian Authority police could assume control. That area became known as H1, where about 210,000 Palestinians live, according to the Palestinian Authority\u2019s Statistics Office.<\/p>\n

The remaining 20% of the territory, home to roughly 50,000 Palestinians and including the Ibrahami Mosque, remained under Israeli army control, although certain powers (such as urban planning) were in Palestinian hands: that is the H2 zone visible from the roof of Fajuri\u2019s friends\u2019 house.<\/p>\n

\"Mapas<\/p>\n

In practice, Israel never fully respected that agreement, and increasingly radical settler families have moved into the city. They can be seen in the Old City \u2014 which Palestinians are often barred from entering on many Saturdays during the sabbat \u2014 escorted by Israeli soldiers<\/a>. Meanwhile, restrictions have been applied to Palestinians seeking access to the Ibrahami Mosque, which is under Israeli control. It can only be reached by passing through a checkpoint.<\/p>\n

On June 16, Smotrich \u2014 who himself lives in the West Bank as a settler in open violation of international law \u2014 wrote on X: \u201cI cancelled the Hebron agreement.\u201d The importance of this decision, he said, lies in that many authorities in Hebron and the holy sites, including the Tomb of the Patriarchs, \u201care no longer in the hands of the terrorist municipality of Hebron, but again become the exclusive responsibility of the State of Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Palestinian activist Issa Amro, 48, who has spent his life fighting and documenting the occupation of his hometown, the most worrying aspect of breaking the 1997 accords is that Hebron\u2019s municipal government, now run by the Palestinian Authority, will no longer have jurisdiction over construction and urban planning in H2.<\/p>\n

Living in fear\"\"Israeli flags on a building in Hebron\u2019s Old City.Mussa Qawasma (REUTERS)<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the end, this means they annex our land without us. When Smotrich talks about cancelling the accords he means H2, where the agreement specified that the Palestinian Authority retained building and planning powers. Life is already very difficult for the Palestinians living in that area. Sometimes I have to pass up to three security checkpoints to get to my home. And if before we already suffered constant power cuts, and Smotrich reduced our water access by 40%, who will provide services for us if Hebron municipality\u2019s authority over that area is restricted?\u201d he laments.<\/p>\n

Amro warns that the consequences of Smotrich\u2019s move \u2014 which Netanyahu\u2019s Cabinet approved months ago and announced officially a few weeks ago \u2014 are already being felt: \u201cLast week he already announced the creation of a new settlement in the Old City. They are bringing in more settlers all the time. They don\u2019t care about destroying the history of our urban core, which is listed as [UNESCO] intangible cultural heritage. Now they even want to build dormitory blocks for the more than 200 Jews who study at the yeshiv\u00e1 [religious study center].\u201d<\/p>\n

He became an activist when Israel closed Hebron University, where he had studied as a young man, and he acknowledges that after Hamas\u2019s October 7, 2023 attacks \u2014 which resulted in the deaths of 1,200 people in Israeli territory \u2014 assaults by settlers and soldiers have skyrocketed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are more armed settlers and more attacks. Since 2023 I have put up more bars and walls at my house. I watch constantly out the window because settlers live just a few meters from me. Somehow we have internalized that they can kill us at any moment with total impunity,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n

Constant raids<\/p>\n

The interview takes place in a caf\u00e9 in the H1 sector farthest from the Old City, but it is still battered by the Israeli army. \u201cEvery day there are raids by the Israeli army. They enter, break into homes and arrest Palestinians. It\u2019s what the army calls code 0\/0: when it calls the Palestinian police and asks them to clear the whole city so the army can enter without restrictions,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n

As Amro speaks, a neighbor, Mohamed (a fictitious name to protect his identity), 35, approaches to greet him. \u201cI\u2019m not surprised the accords were canceled. It was predictable. They are the fruit of what was sown in the past. And now it will increase Israel\u2019s control over the city on many levels: permits, construction… Israel has always treated Palestinians as temporary residents and in this city that feeling is stronger than ever,\u201d he criticizes.<\/p>\n

Mohamed survives on a salary of 1,400 shekels (\u20ac400) from his job in a bar. \u201cI worked for many years in a bar in Tel Aviv, but since October 2023 Israel has revoked work permits for West Bank Palestinians. I can\u2019t go there anymore unless I risk illegally crossing the wall. And I don\u2019t want to be killed or enter illegally,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

He is also clear about the fact that he does not want to leave his land despite the deep sadness that overwhelms him. \u201cYou can see it on our faces: there is a high level of depression. You wake up each day and ask yourself: what can I do today? I speak Hebrew and hear Israelis saying all the time: \u2018This city will return to the Jews.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Aerial view of Hebron (West Bank) in November 2025. In the center, the building known as the Ibrahami Mosque to the Palestinians, or the Tomb of the Patriarchs to the Jews.Ilan Rosenberg (REUTERS)<\/p>\n

What is happening in Hebron reflects the colonial plans the Israeli government has for the rest of the West Bank, territory from which it has been steadily seizing land. In early April, Netanyahu\u2019s government secretly approved the establishment of 34 new settlements from north to south in the occupied Palestinian territory, a move denounced in a report by NGO Peace Now and reported by several Israeli outlets.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll Israeli governments have defended our fundamental right to live in Judea and Samaria, the historic cradle of the Jewish people,\u201d said Israel\u2019s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, a few weeks ago at a meeting with the European commissioner for the Mediterranean, Dubravka \u0160uic.<\/p>\n

And that is exactly what activist Amro denounces: \u201cThis is not about one particular government, it\u2019s about the Israeli system. No one has peace with Palestine on their political agenda.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sign up for our weekly newsletter<\/a> to get more English-language news coverage from EL PA\u00cdS USA Edition<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cDo you see all that trash? The settlers throw it here every day,\u201d says Islam Fajuri, a 38-year-old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":200062,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[41,45206,37,58992],"class_list":["post-200061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-benjamin-netanyahu","tag-hebron","tag-israel","tag-yasir-arafat"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116896247843612298","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/200062"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}