Hawzah News Agency (Occupied Palestine) - Palestinian news outlets reported Wednesday that the two small houses were destroyed the previous day under claims that they had been built without “building permits”, which are impossible to obtain from the Israeli regime, said Ratib al-Jabour, the coordinator of the Anti-Settlement and Wall Committee.
Jabour told Quds Press that the Israeli forces had also seized the solar panels used to supply electricity to the two houses, which belong to Palestinians Khalil Younis Arram and his cousin Ahmad Ismail Arram.
The neighborhood where the two homes were located is surrounded by illegal Israeli settlements and has come under increased attacks by Israeli forces. They frequently raid the Palestinian houses and confiscate any new equipment donated to the residents, including mobile homes funded by the European Union.
The demolition was carried out on the same day as the Tel Aviv regime issued a confiscation order against 2,036 acres of Az-Zawiya village’s lands in the Salfit district of the West Bank.
The land is located in the western part of the village where Israeli settlements are built on Palestinian lands.
Palestinian land owners have been given seven days to appeal through the so-called Israeli Civil Administration.
Thanks to the support it receives from the administration of US President Donald Trump, the Israeli regime has increased its settlement constructions in Palestinian territories since he came to power in 2017.
Trump, who has thrown his weight behind Israel’s policies, recently moved the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem al-Quds after declaring the holy city the capital of the Israeli regime, in a globally-condemned move which was in contravention of international law.
Since 1967, the Israeli regime has been enforcing the draconian policy of demolishing the homes of the Palestinians it deems to be behind fatal attacks against Israeli settlers. The practice, however, was temporarily halted from 2005 to 2014, with the exception of 2009, when scores of homes were sealed and razed in East Jerusalem al-Quds.
Nevertheless, in 2014, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced as a policy the resumption of demolitions in the occupied West Bank.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) also said in July that Israeli authorities demolished 197 Palestinian structures in the West Bank during the first half of 2018.
The OCHA further highlighted that demolitions within the first half of the current year in East Jerusalem al-Quds mark an increase of 12 percent compared to the same period in the preceding year.